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Klopp points to positives in performance following FA Cup loss to United

Liverpool manager Jürgen Klopp says there are a number of positives to take away from their FA C...



Klopp points to positives in p...
Soccer

Klopp points to positives in performance following FA Cup loss to United

Liverpool manager Jürgen Klopp says there are a number of positives to take away from their FA Cup fourth-round defeat to Manchester United.

Mo Salah scored twice for the visitors - marking his first-ever goals at the ground.

Mason Greenwood, Marcus Rashford and Bruno Fernandes meanwhile all found the back of the net for Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's side.

The result leaves the Premier League champions with just one win in their last seven matches in all competitions - and that was against an Aston Villa youth team.

Speaking after the game Klopp said although it's disappointing to lose, there were elements of the game he was happy to see.

"It’s not what we wanted, so it’s frustrating. If you want to win tonight, you have to play at your absolute top. We weren’t on our absolute top, but we made a lot of steps in the right direction.

"The start of the game was good, but then we made decisive mistakes; around the first goal United scored, we had too many options offensively and no protection. We lost the ball and then there was a counter-attack. It was not the first counter-attack in the game, so we have to improve that.

"You could see the boys really wanted to change the fortune, they wanted to score goals and that’s good. We did that, we scored twice, which is good as well.

"That’s all OK but in the end they scored three, we scored two and they are through and we are not. That’s a fact as well. We can take positives out of this game, of course – I saw a lot of steps in the right direction and that’s all good. It was good preparation for the Tottenham game with their counter-attacking threat. We know exactly what we have to work on.

"If you are in a situation you don’t like, you want to get out of it. We want to get out of it and for that we have to make steps. Tonight we made these steps – not the final ones, but we made steps and that’s for the moment OK."

The result leaves the Premier League champions with just one win in their last seven matches in all competitions - and that was against an Aston Villa youth team.

Klopp didn't play down the gravity of the situation he and his side find themselves in but he was keen not to blame his players.

"There’s no doubt about my trust. But trust doesn’t mean we are not critical of ourselves, it’s not that I say, ‘You did everything right in the last few years so now I don’t care if you made some mistakes.’ That’s not like this.

"We are really in the situation 100 percent. But you don’t have to worry about us, as a group we are really together. We know it.

"If I have a problem, we have a problem. If one player has a problem, we have a problem. That’s all our problem at the moment so we have to sort it together and that’s what we will do.

"Nobody thinks about the very good things that happened in the last few years – nobody. We are just in this moment and try to win football games again. That’s all."

When asked about his side's confidence Klopp said scoring is an issue but it's something he feels can and will be resolved.

"Tonight I didn’t see any confidence problems. But what we said is when you don’t score for a while it’s not good for the confidence, obviously.

"The best strikers in the world can tell you they all had moments when they didn’t score with each chance. But it’s all about how you deal with it. We are on it, believe me, and we will sort that."

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Fa Cup Jurgen Klopp Liverpool Manchester United