Allardyce admits he wishes he was in Jurgen Klopp’s position

Oli Fisher
Jurgen Klopp: Happy to shake hands with Sam Allardyce

Sam Allardyce has claimed cannot understand why Jurgen Klopp would be worried about him with the attacking resources that Liverpool have.

New Everton boss Allardyce takes his side to Anfield on Sunday hoping to repeat the feat he managed with Crystal Palace in April, when the Eagles came from a goal down to claim victory.

That was the last time an away side triumphed at Anfield and Liverpool go into the Merseyside derby on the back of three straight wins in which they have scored 15 goals.

Klopp said in his press conference that Allardyce had ‘done a job’ on Liverpool the three times he has faced him in the past.

“He shouldn’t be too worried about me the way his team is playing at the moment,” said Allardyce. “If I was sat in his position with the players that he’s got, it’s a wonderful situation.

“I haven’t had the time to go the lengths and depths I’ve gone to with the other teams I’ve had. And of course I’ve got a completely different set of players here.

“It will all be about those players taking on board the information that we give them without taking away their responsibility to make the right decisions at the right times.”

Allardyce got off to a great start as Toffees manager with a 2-0 victory over Huddersfield last weekend.

But he is all too aware of the threat posed by Liverpool’s attackers, with Philippe Coutinho, Mohamed Salah, Sadio Mane and Roberto Firmino all on the scoresheet in the 7-0 Champions League win over Spartak Moscow.

“Sometimes you just have to hold your hands up and say the pure genius of the movement and the quality of the players, you can’t say, if we can block these one or two players off we will stop Liverpool, it’s more than that at the moment, there’s four or five,” said Allardyce.

“That’s the hard bit for us. And also their finishing ability has increased, they don’t have to rely on one or two people to score goals, there’s goals all around the frontline now so we’ve got to make sure we try our very best to cope with that.

“We won last year at Palace and that was after going a goal down. I’ve got to look at that, what did we do. I think Liverpool are playing much better today but it can be done.”

Allardyce was evasive on reports of a January move for Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang from Borussia Dortmund but did not rule it out.

Asked if he was the sort of player who could replace Romelu Lukaku’s goals, Allardyce said: “Possibly but it is the hardest thing today to recruit a centre-forward who scores goals. And is it the right type of centre-forward that scores goals?

“My first signing has to be correct, has to be the right signing for Everton and for my future. You make bad signings, you get the sack.”

Unusually, Allardyce did not travel with what was a second-string side for the 3-0 Europa League victory over Apollon Limassol on Thursday because of a pre-arranged medical appointment.

He insisted it was nothing to worry about, saying: “It was just a standard check-up. Unfortunately I’m 63 now and my life revolves around keeping on top of my health.

“I’m not expecting anything other than an all clear. At all costs I didn’t want to miss that appointment.”