Klopp: That was not a normal Liverpool performance

Mark Holmes
Jurgen Klopp: Knows Arsenal can play it direct

Jurgen Klopp: Knows Arsenal can play it direct

Jurgen Klopp insists his much-changed Liverpool side could have won at Swansea City had they produced a “normal performance”.

Klopp made eight changes to the side beaten in Villarreal on Thursday but felt the XI he selected was still plenty good enough to claim a positive result in south Wales.

“I’m disappointed,” Klopp said. “We could have won this game with a normal performance. But that’s what we have to think about.

“We played not as good as we could, that’s for sure. Our performance was not as good as possible with this line-up. We could have played much better with these individuals, we are professionals.

“We tried to bring fresh legs, fresh minds. I’m only disappointed because I know we could have played better.

“It’s not always a honeymoon. You have to prove, to deliver – and today didn’t work too well. That’s not a problem for the future.

“Anything I could say now would sound like an excuse. There is nothing to excuse today.”

Liverpool have certainly improved under Klopp, reaching the Europa League semi-final and even giving themselves an outside chance of a top-four finish going into the Swansea game, but the German is under no illusions of the work still to be done.

“The first two goals were too simple for Swansea,” he said. “We deserved the defeat, and a big part of this result was our performance.

“I’m not the type of guy who changes his mind everyday. We have a long way to go for sure.

“In the first half we lost a lot of easy balls. We did not play an aggressive game. It was too easy for Swansea.

“The performance today was maybe influenced by the number of games we’ve had. But I can’t change the number of games we’ve had.

“Now, in this moment, from now on [the priority is] the Europa League. Then next Sunday the Premier League!”