Jurgen kloop's is looking forward to coming up against close friend David Wagner and his Norwich city side in the Emirates FA cup on sunday afternoon
Liverpool host the Canaries at Anfield in the fourth round of the competition, with the managers in the dugout sharing a special relationship that stretches back to their days as teammates at FSV Mainz 05.
To preview the tie, Klopp held a press conference at the AXA Training Centre on Thursday afternoon – read on for a summary of what he had to say…
[I] didn't think about it, to be honest, because we are far off having four finals. We qualified for one. But we learned that year it makes no sense to plan the next one if you didn't even play the first one. All the competitions are not made that somebody wins all of them. That's just how it is because of the number of games. I saw now if we win on Sunday, the final is obviously on Sunday the 25th [of February] and then three days later is the next FA Cup round. That's how it is. There's nothing to learn about. The question will come if we do that again and would qualify for three finals – [which] again is very unlikely, it's the nature of the thing – then everybody will ask what does it mean for next year and stuff like this.
Because after we did that, obviously the after was not great. But that had plenty of reasons and only one of 500 reasons was that we played all the finals and [were] in the league until the last matchday. So, that's not a problem at all. But we don't have to worry about that now. We are just happy that we could qualify for that one and it was a big one. The response in the dressing room was really cool. It was really nice to see how much it meant to the boys. I didn't question that actually, I just said before the game that it obviously means everything to Fulham and if it means to us as much we have to show it on the pitch, and that's what I saw.
ON WHAT THE SEASON SO FAR SAYS ABOUT THE CURRENT SQUAD..
A lot, a lot. We speak pretty much about that from the beginning of the season, if you want, because we had the turnarounds in the beginning of the season, very early. Did we have a red card at Chelsea? No, that was probably the only game in the beginning when we didn't get a red card! But then Bournemouth and all the things started and we had to come from behind and these kind of things. We said then [that] it helps to grow together as a group. It does. You cannot plan, you cannot do a pre-season and say afterwards, 'We start all the games with 10 men and let's see how far we get.' But that's true. Since then we had different things, loads of injuries to deal with and that's never good, it's just not good. We want to have them all available but if it happens, you cannot change it in the moment anymore, so you have to try to work with that and that's what we did obviously.
That's where I think Jarell Quansah is just a product of that. He would have had games anyway but the amount [he currently has]? I'm not sure, I don't know. That's how it is now. Conor Bradley would have had more games already if he wouldn't have been injured himself. And Bobby Clark, it's so nice to bring him on now. Everybody sees he is ready. That's the next step for him. Was he ready half a year ago? I don't know but now he is and now we can bring him on and he can fill the role and make an impression. That's really good. It just shows that an injury crisis or what you want to call it gives opportunities. In these specific cases, the boys used them and that's really nice. And we came through all that so far.
But now we are really on the edge, nothing can happen anymore, to be honest. We have the same amount of games coming up, we play all the time now from now on, so we need them all and we need them all back. And I hope that Thiago [Alcantara] and Stefan [Bajcetic] will be back as well rather sooner than later, that would be cool. Kosti [Kostas Tsimikas] is close. Kosti is actually fit, Kosti just has to wait now for the green light because the bone healing takes much longer, but the plate is doing the job in the moment. Now we have to figure out when is one taking enough over, let me say it like that. And then he's in training as well. He was not out that long, like Trent was not, like Dom was not. Let's go from there. It just says the boys understand that we have some quality and we want to use it to [the] full extent. That's it.
On Andy Robertson returning to the matchday squad at Fulham...
Definitely having a rest is good [but] three months is definitely too long, especially for Robbo, who is not used to that. And when it happened, that time long ago, it was a real shocker. Of course we knew we have Kosti but we had an awful lot of games coming up, so in that moment Kosti stepped, in the same moment and later on especially Joey [Gomez] stepped in. That's all very, very positive. Joey is definitely, if you want to have that, the winner of the season so far because he's just back to his best. It's really cool for us and very good for him. We had solutions without knowing that we will have [them] to that extent because there was no real drop-off – that's the best thing to say. We had to adapt from a formation point of view but it's not a massive problem, we can do that. That's what we always said, if a few injures [happen] we can always deal with, you have to. And if one or two more come up then you have to maybe change formation or stuff like this, and that's what we did and so far it worked out.
On how much he enjoys meetings with Wagner...
I enjoy a lot and we had already conversations about it. He asked me for massive rotation! I told him that doesn't help, obviously! [He did a] really good job but a really difficult job. I think the start of the season was really good and then they lose more or less their offensive department and that's when they struggled a bit. Now they are in touching distance of the play-off spots. They lost last night, I didn't see anything about it yet, about the Leeds game. They obviously have big games coming up. So, the Championship season itself is already pretty intense but if you have a longer FA Cup run in it, it's obviously very similar to a very successful Premier League season with international football or something like that, because of the amount of teams in the league and the amount of games you have.
I follow it as much as I can because I'm just interested in everything he is doing. It's cool to have the game. When he worked at Huddersfield, he watched a lot of games here in the stadium, when they didn't play he was here, and now he's back. He didn't see the new stand, I think. We didn't see each other for a long time, so the next time probably would have been in the summer, so now it's good to catch up and to lock horns again.
On Quansah's form this season…
I liked him from the first moment I saw him, but that means what does the boy offer from a physical point of view when they are really young, 16, 17, 18 – that's how long I've known him. I knew he was a good footballer, which is absolutely helpful and not 'rare' nowadays, but it is quite special how calm he is on the ball. And then it is all about when is he ready for adult football? Because in that position each challenge is a reality check. So you might be the best in your age group but first and foremost that means nothing for the adult world, because you have strong opponents, they know all the dark arts and all these kind of things, how to bring yourself into better positions.
He's dealing with that – I didn't expect it that quick, that's true. But the pre-season was super-positive. We got asked a lot that we have to sign a new centre-half, and obviously we were thinking about that as well, it's not that we ignore potential issues or whenever. But when we saw him, it was clear that we will not go for it, that we will have our own solution and without knowing how much game time he will get already this year.
Because of the situation and because of his development, he's obviously now a proper, proper part of the squad, a proper part of the rotation thing. It's not [just] about performing, they all are good, it's about how can you share intensity, and there he plays an important role. Last night again was a really good game. The way we played with the last line, I wouldn't call it risky but it's not a normal centre-half game. You have a lot of one-v-one situations, a lot of space in behind you very often and we have to be brave – and he's really brave in these situations. And with the ball he is brave as well and he has a really good overview and good technique. So, it's an interesting package. I'm really excited about it.