Klopp admits Liverpool “lost the plot” in their Europa League shocker against Atalanta – but has warned his players cannot dwell on their dismal setback.
The Reds are on the brink of elimination after they slumped to a 3-0 defeat at Anfield against the Serie A side
Gianluca Scamacca scored twice and Mario Pasalic also netted as Atalanta inflicted the joint-heaviest home defeat for Liverpool in European history.
while Diogo Jota made his return from injury after two months out as a late substitute, an unhappy Klopp admits there were few positives on a dire night.
Klopp
“We can make this the shortest press conference, it was a really bad game, oh my God,”
“We started really well and then didn’t continue. Before they scored even, we just lost the plot a little bit.”
“We were everywhere and nowhere. Midfield was spread like that, right midfield and left midfield, I didn’t recognise it a bit, it was really quite strange.
“In football terms, that’s tactical discipline. But we had a big chance from Darwin and unlucky from Harvey and then they scored a goal and then we kept playing into their hands, to be honest.
“A really good example of how it could have looked is the (disallowed) goal we scored. Striker wide, full-back on the left in a massive space, has all the time in the world to cross the ball and Mo scores.
“We should have had these situations more often. We didn’t use the man-marking besides that.
“Diogo came on and now we can’t think he is the solution. He needs time and was just happy to play and you could see that changed a lot.”
Klopp added
“We played a bad game, we deserved to lose and we must feel that now,”
“But the boys have exactly this night to feel bad about it and then we have to build up again for the Crystal Palace game. That’s how it is.
“Congratulations to Atalanta, really well done. Atalanta cause many teams problems with the way they defend.
“You need a lot of tactical disciple to do what they did. They played man-marking all over the pitch and that’s the reason they won the game.
“In these moments you just want to be with the ball, man-marking is uncomfortable when you aren’t on top of your game.
“If you are in a better playing mood than we were tonight then you can cause massive problems but we didn’t.
“They defended us and we didn’t try long enough to play. Then we just suffered from the way they defended. That’s pretty much the explanation (for the loss).”
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