The Liverpool boss handed debuts to midfielders Kevin Stewart and Ryan Kent while defender Tiago Ilori partnered Jose Enrique, who was making his first start in ages, in the center of defence.
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Exeter couldn’t have wished for a better opponent for the third round tie – the League Two outfit are up against the five times European Champions – surely there is a cup romance on the way.
Backed by the vocal home support, it was Exeter that took the lead in the ninth minute when Tom Nichols, who had found space inside the box, converted a super low cross from Jamie Reid.
And he was reluctant to talk about Lee Holmes’ second goal for Exeter, which sailed embarrassingly straight past goalkeeper Adam Bogdan from a corner on the stroke of half-time, compounding the club’s ongoing issues between the sticks.
“If you want to criticise anyone, criticise me and leave the players alone”, Klopp said after goals from Jerome Sinclair and Brad Smith prevented Liverpool losing to fourth-tier opposition in the FA Cup for the first time.
“I don’t think there is any blame at the manager and his staff – it’s the nature of the Premier League and the intensity of how we play the games that will be very new to Jurgen”.
“The FA Cup is a great tournament, we know about it, but we have to make the decisions for the Liverpool team, for my team, and so we have to make changes”.
“We know about our situation, we know in most of the cases about the reasons”, Klopp said Thursday, “and so it’s often the situation where one injury at the wrong moment is a problem for the whole squad, because other players have to play too much”. I was just trying to say he hasn’t experienced this level of football before and maybe that might be one of the causes. We had a few moments, but not enough, and it didn’t work 100 per cent.
Liverpool equalised in the second half to see the game finish 2-2 but many Exeter City fans were happy that they would be enjoying a replay at Anfield later this month.
Check out this free online live stream of the game here to watch Liverpool take on Exeter City in round three of the FA Cup!
“They tried everything but we have to be more robust”, he told BBC Sport.
“It was only that they helped us in our situation and we have another game to go on”.
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“But the draw was the logical result, we deserved it”. “The pitch was hard for both teams, the first goal of Exeter was their first attack. We didn’t park the bus, we gave it a right go and we’ve got a trip to Anfield”. Although there have been wins over Chelsea, Manchester City and Premier League surprise package Leicester City, they have also lost convincingly to Watford and West Ham in recent weeks.
