Jurgen Klopp has bemoaned Liverpool’s poor start in their 2-2 Premier League draw with Manchester City at Anfield on Sunday.
Although the score-line was 0-0 at the break, City dominated every metric and could have easily been in front. Liverpool were much improved in the second half though, with Mohamed Salah creating and then scoring a goal.
However, it was not enough to get the three points with City netting through Phil Foden and Kevin De Bruyne to ensure the points were shared.
At full time Klopp reflected that things could have been worse for his side by half time.
“Thank god a football game has two halves,” he said. “We are really happy about the second and not so happy about the first for obvious reasons.
“We did a lot of things wrong in the first half and City did a lot of things right in the first half so we never got really in the game.
“We weren’t much worse, we never played enough football. I was most happy in my career about the half-time whistle. It was never planned that we played like this and we needed half-time and we used half-time and played a really good second half.”
Klopp reserved special praise for Salah. The Egyptian set up Sadio Mane for the opener with a terrific run and pass, before grabbing a fantastic goal of his own.
Receiving the ball surrounded by a crowd of City players, he worked his way into the box, creating some space and then fired home.
Klopp clearly enjoyed the goal, adding: “If Leo Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo score that goal then the world says it’s world class. He (Salah) is one of the best players in the world, that’s how it is.”
