Jurgen Klopp has dismissed talk of departures at Liverpool and welcomed the selection dilemmas he is faced with thanks to his large squad.
Pre-season has served as a valuable opportunity for the German to experiment with a number of systems and players- all of which have impressed at some point.
The Reds boss insists he is happy for his players to be angry over not starting every game and has urged them to continue fighting in the manner they have been.
Klopp has also defied reports suggesting certain individuals at the club would be sold this summer.
“Everybody thought ‘he’s going, he’s going, he’s going’ but so far nobody is going,” Klopp told the Liverpool Echo.
“If we stay together like this there will be a few hard decisions because they can’t start all together. Then we have to see how this works.”
“Be angry at me, no problem, stay confident, that is important, then three days (later) there is another game so let’s be there again. There are a lot of challenges.”
“The plan is that they all make the next step. Of course we want to build on the base of last year. I said we always want to develop this team and there are two things to do – signings and training so we did both.”
“The signings are nice, either they play or they push another player. Now it’s more difficult to play all the time.”
Most of the speculation surrounding possible departures has revolved around Philippe Coutinho, amid Barcelona’s pursuit of the Brazilian.
There also remains to be uncertainty over what will happen next with the likes of Alberto Moreno, Jon Flanagan and Daniel Sturridge – all of which have previously been tipped to move on this summer.
Klopp now finds himself in charge of a squad in which every player has contributed positively ahead of the new Premier League season and where his strongest lineup is becoming increasingly difficult to decide.
This is even before the possible arrival of new signings, with the Reds keen to bolster their defence with the addition of Southampton’s Virgil van Dijk and potentially also keen on recruiting another midfielder having failed in their pursuit of RB Leipzig’s Naby Keita.
With regards to outgoings at the club, Klopp is seemingly still making a decision over certain and notably rejuvenated members of the team.
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