Jurgen Klopp has defended his decision to drop Sturridge to the bench against Tottenham, stating it was a tactical decision.
Advertisement
The Liverpool attacker was a constant menace as the Reds impressed in Saturday’s draw at White Hart Lane, and Pochettino has admitted he needs to add pace to his front line.
Naturally, the perceived snub drew plenty of attention from the media in the aftermath of the game, with former Liverpool player and manager Graeme Souness revealing his belief that the England worldwide had “a mountain to club” to force his way back into the starting line-up on Sky Sports after the clash.
Rio Ferdinand has urged Daniel Sturridge to stay and fight for his Liverpool career.
“Daniel Sturridge is a wonderfully skilful player”, Klopp said.
“This game showed again what we can do, how we can play”.
“It is true we wanted to play a little bit long but we started to make some mistakes”.
“There’s no big mountain for him”.
But he felt that there were “not plenty more chances” for “a football-playing team” and “a good side like Tottenham” at home, which Klopp believes says “a lot” about their defending.
Spurs will lose a host of stars, mainly to England, and Pochettino believes it is too early in the season to schedule worldwide matches.
The 26-year-old has been on the field for just 67 minutes of Liverpool’s three Premier League games so far, but Klopp played down suggestions that Sturridge may have permanently lost his place in the team. He did not have a ideal pre-season.
“He didn’t have a a ideal preseason, other players have played more together in preseason and that’s an advantage”. They played together. They’ve trained from the first day of pre-season together so of course that’s an advantage.
But something tells us the former Man City and Chelsea man wasn’t terribly pleased with the idea of Origi getting onto the field ahead of him.
Advertisement
“Nobody has real rhythm”.
