Arsenal vs Liverpool: Jurgen Klopp wants the Reds to be as annoying as possible to Manchester City

Liverpool received a major boost in their quest for the Premier League title after leaders Manchester City stumbled at Crystal Palace. Pep Guardiola’s side were held to a surprise goalless draw at Palace on Monday night. It means Liverpool are now only four points behind City and have a game in hand. If the Reds beat Arsenal on Wednesday night in the league, they will be able to reduce the gap to a single point. However, Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp is well aware of the difficult challenge lying ahead of them when they travel to Emirates Stadium to face Mikel Arteta’s Gunners.

Speaking about Manchester City’s draw with Crystal Palace, Klopp, in his pre-match press conference, said, “I watched for exactly 65 minutes for analyse reasons, believe it or not. Just to have a look at what they [Man City] are doing. I don’t have very often time to watch games in real time, so when they are really happening, I like to watch it back and stuff like this. Crystal Palace did really well but City did well as well, [they] just didn’t finish the situations off and the last 30 minutes or whatever I didn’t watch it. I got some points, saw the result and was surprised.”

READ MORE – The Reds travel to Emirates aiming to close the gap on leaders City

It all depends on our results still: Klopp

Klopp was asked whether the Man City result changes the squad mood ahead of the crucial Arsenal clash. He replied, “Why should it? It would impact the mood if we would be in our minds in this competition with City and things – ‘we have them here, we have them there’ or stuff like this. But the fact is we play Arsenal and we are still four points behind. I don’t know how you can count points away at Arsenal just now already and think, ‘It’s only one point.’” 

“I think it’s easy for you, but it is four points and we have to play this game. As we all know, if we want to reach something in this Premier League and you are not top of the table, sometimes you need the other teams to drop points. I’m not sure now it was already necessary or not, we will see. It all depends on our results still. That’s why we think about them and not the others.”

Klopp on pushing Manchester City to the limit

Klopp then spoke about how he wants to keep pushing Manchester City all the way in the title race even if it means they have to be “as annoying as possible” to their title rivals. “That’s the plan, that’s the plan of course: that we keep being as annoying as possible. But how I said, we have to win our football games but that doesn’t help when I say it here. You know it anyway [so] why should we say ‘that’s now not our cup of tea’?” he stated. 

“No, of course we are very ambitious and very determined to do great stuff, but we respect a lot how good they are [and] we respect even more how good the other teams are we face on the way there. I have now not all 10 games we have to play [in mind] but there are a few really tough ones. Each Premier League game is tough but a few are especially tough. One of them we play tomorrow night and sitting here and I say ‘we win 10 games’ – it doesn’t sound very likely but as long as it is possible we will give it a proper try, I can tell you.”