JURGEN KLOPP WAS not convinced Liverpool had it in them to claim all three points against Aston Villa after his side completed a dramatic comeback on Saturday.
Late headers from Andy Robertson and Sadio Mane salvaged a 2-1 win for Liverpool, meaning the Premier League leaders keep up their remarkable unbeaten run in the Premier League.
The Reds have now avoided defeat in their last 28 top-flight matches, their last loss being a 2-1 reverse to title rivals Manchester City back in January.
However, while Klopp has full confidence in his side’s powers of recovery, he acknowledged a host of missed chances prior to Robertson’s equaliser did not fill him with belief that a win was on the cards.
“No,” Klopp answered when asked if he expected to win the match in stoppage time. ”But if there is enough time, I know that we will try [to win].
“When we got the equaliser, I thought that was the main thing we deserved today. A couple of things I didn’t like in the first half, but not enough to lose the game with all the passion we showed in the second half.
Quite nervy, to be honest. I didn’t like it too much. Playing against a team who wanted to fight, not enough good finishing. Of course it was difficult for us. We scored a goal, which I don’t know why exactly was given offside, but who cares now?
“We stayed in the game and tried everything, became better and better, it was pretty intense. Everything went against us pretty much, but we scored a wonderful first goal.
“The set-piece routine we have tried in lots of games worked in the big moment. Of course it is unlucky for Aston Villa but we were dominant today, it was clear as well, though they would have deserved something for all they put in. That’s not cool I know, but the deserved winner was us and we did it.”
Liverpool looked to have scored an equaliser much earlier on after Trezeguet had put Villa ahead midway through the first half, only for Roberto Firmino to have his goal disallowed for offside.
VAR failed to overturn what appeared an incorrect call on closer inspection, though the Premier League subsequently confirmed on social media that Firmino’s armpit was actually offside, much to Klopp’s bemusement.
“It looked like they took a minute or longer until they found the picture where Bobby is offside,” Klopp said when asked about the incident.
What can I say about that? When we got the introduction to us, offside to me looked really easy. This time somebody looked like somebody tried really hard to find any part of Bobby that could be offside and in the end he was offside.
“I think nobody is 100 per cent happy. The referees aren’t 100 per cent happy, how can I be 100 per cent happy about today after that? I’m not too angry about it because we won the game, but maybe if we hadn’t it would have been different.”
