Jurgen Klopp has issued a defiant message to Liverpool fans – and indeed to Arsenal and Manchester City – ahead of his team’s concluding five matches of the Premier League season.
The Reds are currently level on points with the table-topping Gunners, who could lay down a marker if they beat Chelsea tonight but may also leave the door open for us to overtake them should they drop points and we win at Everton on Wednesday.
The 56-year-old has been in this position several times before during his reign at Anfield in terms of a neck-and-neck title race where the margin for error is nonexistent.
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Liverpool’s win at Fulham on Sunday ended a mini-slump which threatened to see our campaign peter out to an anti-climax, but while the victory at Craven Cottage wasn’t without its complications, Klopp knows from experience that getting three points from each game at this stage is all that counts.
Speaking in his press conference this afternoon, the German said (via Liverpool Echo): “This is the last part of the season. It’s not about playing the freshest football of the year, that would be strange, but you have to win games and I think we know how to do that.”
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The topic of player burnout was thrust into the limelight yet again by Pep Guardiola’s furious comments after Man City narrowly saw off Chelsea in the FA Cup semi-finals on Saturday, and it’s an issue that Klopp has also broached more than once this term.
It’s understandable that even the most seasoned of title contenders and league champions could be running on empty by this stage of an intense, gruelling campaign, and that performances might duly be laced with imperfections.
However, every Liverpool fan, player and coach would gladly take a quintet of hard-fought one-goal victories if it means that Virgil van Dijk will be hoisting the Premier League trophy aloft at Anfield on 19 May.
The Reds won each of their last nine top-flight games in the title run-in in 2018/19, and 16 of the last 18 a couple of seasons ago, so they’ve proven that they can compile prolonged winning streaks during the business end of a campaign.
We’ll still need a helping hand from upcoming opponents of Arsenal and City if we’re to give Klopp a trophy-winning send-off next month, but LFC have form for taking care of their own business when it gets to this stage, even if it’s not always pretty.