With the Premier League fixtures coming thick and fast in the demanding winter period, Klopp would like to see his club maintain their recent good run of form.
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Liverpool have been flying high this season, producing scintillating displays to sit second in the Premier League table. The Reds were equally good in Europe, winning all their group stage matches in the Champions League. The Anfield club currently has 37 points from 16 matches and are four behind leaders Manchester City. However, Jurgen Klopp’s side have a game in hand, which they will play against Newcastle United on Thursday night in the league. A victory in the midweek clash can help the Reds close the gap at the top to just one point. With the Premier League fixtures coming thick and fast in the demanding winter period, Klopp would like to see his club maintain their recent good run of form, which helped them leapfrog Chelsea in the league standings.
“Everybody is involved and everybody must be ready. I have now no special things to offer,” he told a press conference. “We play five games in 13 days, so there’s no ‘have a look’ or whatever. We have to play, in an ideal world, the best football possible then recover pretty quickly and then get focused again and go again. That’s what we have to do – the whole squad. But that’s not new. I’m not here since a few days, I’m here for a few years now and that’s how it is. This time is very demanding for everybody but that’s how it is.”
Asked about the new COVID-19 measures, Klopp, as per their club’s website, replied, “I support these new measures, absolutely. We get tested every day and before the games PCR tested – it’s absolutely fine. So how it is in these times, I’m here earlier in the training ground than most of the players. It means we get tested before we arrive, go then back to the cars and when the lateral flow is negative, then we are allowed in the training ground.”
“Yesterday we were all negative and we hope that’s the case for today. That’s it pretty much. We are, like the whole world, concerned about it, absolutely. But we do what we can and the vaccination status of the team is quite good – I think we got all boostered who are eligible to get boostered. For some medical reasons, some were not allowed in that moment but they will be done in the next few days and the rest got the booster a few days ago, and hopefully we can do it with the whole team.”
Jurgen Klopp also opened up about the timely return to training for forward Roberto Firmino and midfielder Curtis Jones. “Yes, absolutely. Bobby trained completely normal yesterday, so I would say he’s in contention. And Curtis had the first session like partial with the team, so he’s not far off. Timing-wise, [it] couldn’t be better, to be honest. How we all know, busy period, we need a full squad and getting two players of this calibre is obviously good news. So, that’s it,” he explained.
The Liverpool manager was then asked about the changes he has observed at Newcastle United since Eddie Howe came in. “More possession, more shots on target, more shots in general – so, obviously more offensive things. I know Eddie for a long time now as a colleague and we played against Bournemouth quite frequently. You can see glimpses of the Bournemouth style. They played now 4-4-2 in the majority of the games but with Bournemouth against us at Anfield when we won 2-1 [in March 2020] and they caused us some problems, they played a 4-5-1 so they might consider that, these kinds of things. Eddie is a few weeks there and of course you can see his influence,” he explained.
