Jurgen Klopp praised Mohamed Salah and Darwin Nunes after Liverpool beat Newcastle 4-2 to go three points clear at the top of the Premier League.
When Spurs faced Anfield on New Year’s Day, Salah scored twice and Nunes assisted the first goal.
Salah, who missed a penalty in the first half, received the ball from Núñez in the second half and followed Dominik Szoboszlai’s quick move before Luis Diaz beat Alexandre Isak to make it 1-1. Curtis Jones and Cody Gakpo both made it 3-1 before Sven Botman headed in a corner from the Kop End, but Salah had the final say when he scored from the penalty spot after substitute Diogo Jota. It was demolished.
Salah, who has scored a total of 18 goals this season, is set to play for Egypt at the Africa Cup of Nations later this month and Klopp gave his post-match assessment.”You shouldn’t be surprised that Mo can change the game because he has done it hundreds of times,” Klopp said. “But this is a very good example. The more goals you set, the more you learn to miss opportunities.
You know what to do, you move on, you improve, you take advantage of the situation and Mo did that.” “I get asked a lot about Mo and not about Darwin. But it was only a game and it was Darwin’s first goal when he fed the ball to Mo that put the game in the right direction.“Everyone on the pitch tried to get the ball to the keeper but he saved it and it was 1-0. unbelievable.” Yes, it was a great game from start to finish. I said it a few times and I didn’t like it, but Pep Linders came in and said he needed a McCa (Alexis McAllister) pass, so I brought him in.
Diogo was also very good from start to finish and it was useful to have that option,” Klopp added. “I love the game and I love the atmosphere. Apart from the goal, you could see on Alisson’s face that he wasn’t happy with him, but we’ll accept that and move on.
“Honestly, Curtis’ high pressure and counter-pressing made this a special game. We all know how good Curtis is. It’s technically brilliant. But he is finding more and more direction in dribbling, getting out of tight spaces and pressing and really defining the level and what it should be.
He guarded every player in the match and his counter pressing was very special. “People often say that my attitude is not good and that I am not suitable for ordinary football. Well, maybe the ordinary person wants to counter-press and should watch videos about it, so it is very useful.” People often say that my behavior is not very good and that it is good for mediocre football or something.
Well, this is very useful because you may want to go back from the base and you need to watch a video about it.”I had a lot of good games, I can’t remember a bad one. To be honest, everything was very good. But Newcastle weren’t 100%, but they had to be because they were going through a really tough time. .
