Chelsea’s point keeps them in ninth, ten points behind Liverpool and a staggering 31 short of Leicester’s tally of 80, and Wednesday’s display summed up the Blues’ season.
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The visitors eventually broke the deadlock and it was Eden Hazard who opened the scoring with the Belgian global dancing his way through the Liverpool defence before finding the bottom corner with a fine effort.
Liverpool left it late for their equaliser, substitute Christian Benteke getting the goal in the second minute of stoppage time after Asmir Begovic, stepping in for the mysteriously incapacitated Thibaut Courtois, made a hash of a cross.
Liverpool can still embellish their season with victory in the Europa League final against Sevilla and secure Champions League qualification with it. But Klopp will not allow any let-up in the remaining league games against Chelsea and at West Bromwich Albion on Sunday.
The Liverpool manager will crack the whip in an attempt to drill his squad into one of the fittest in the Premier League and has told his players they will have only two weeks’ complete break this summer.
“It’s quite hard when you have the ball and the manager says you need to be patient and everybody shouts ‘run!’ That’s a little bit hard”.
“In all of the (pre-season) games we will play out full training”, Klopp said.
“We are really serious people and we think a lot about what we do”. We had most offensive formation we could have in the last 15 minutes.
At the other end, Bertrand Traore got away from Kolo Toure inside the penalty area but couldn’t find the power in his shot to trouble Liverpool keeper Simon Mignolet.
“What we have learned this season is that as long as it’s 1-0 it’s the best result to draw”.
“He’s played a lot of games in the youth teams”.
“We can get sixth position”.
“They came to win the game and after the first half they were not too sure they were in the game because we played very well”. “There is not one per cent negativity around the final”. “Sevilla are a really good side, they have got the experience in this competition, have won it many times and gone far in it. It is going to be a tough game, but a final is a final and you never know what might happen”.
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Asked if he considered his goal to be special, Hazard replied: “It’s not special because we didn’t win!”
