Jurgen Klopp said Liverpool “showed up today” after his side beat Premier League champions Manchester City 1-0 in a thrilling contest at Anfield on Sunday.
Mohamed Salah’s 76th-minute strike gave Klopp’s team just their third win of the Premier League season and slowed City’s title charge.
“Result, perfect,” said Klopp, who was shown a red card late in the game. “Performance, really, really good, in an incredibly intense game.
“We defended at an incredibly high level for 99 minutes almost. They had their moments but especially in the box we did extremely well.
![[FILE] Liverpool’s Egyptian midfielder Mohamed Salah (L) runs with the ball as Arsenal’s Brazilian defender Gabriel closes in during the English Premier League football match between Arsenal and Liverpool at the Emirates Stadium in London. (Photo by Catherine Ivill / POOL / AFP)](https://www.afriupdate.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/000_97B779-scaled-e1703231851386-120x86.jpg "Liverpool host Arsenal in battle for Premier League Christmas No. 1 3")
“This was for us obviously big today. We showed up today and that is all we wanted to do.”
Klopp praised “sensational” awareness from goalkeeper Alisson Becker to free Salah for the goal.
“Outstanding from Mo,” he said. “He might miss one but he will not miss two in a similar situation.
“Goals decide the game but there were so many good football moments against what I would say is the best football team in the world.”
Pep Guardiola said his City team were punished for making a mistake in a game of “fine margins”.
“This is Anfield — every time you come here lately unfortunately this is Anfield,” he added.
“We played a really good game but this is a game where there are really fine margins and the mistakes are punished. We made a mistake and we cannot concede and that’s why we lost the game.
“We played to beat Liverpool today, definitely we played for that. After 1-0 the crowd shouted but we shouted more on the pitch.”
City thought they had snatched the lead early in the second half through Phil Foden but VAR spotted a foul by Erling Haaland on Fabinho in the build-up and the goal was disallowed.
“The referee said played on, played on, played on, there were a thousand million fouls like this and this one is because we scored a goal,” said Guardiola.
“So they disallowed because we scored a goal, otherwise it would not have been disallowed. We lost because we make a mistake but this is Anfield.
“The crowd tried (to throw coins and objects) but they didn’t touch me. Maybe next time they will be better.”
Follow our socials Whatsapp, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Google News.
