Liverpool crumbled to an awful defeat 3-0 at home to an impressive Atalanta on Thursday evening as their Europa League hopes were left hanging by a thread
It was the stuff of nightmares for Liverpool at Anfield on Thursday night, and Jurgen Klopp didn’t have any complaints.
His Reds team were well and truly beaten 3-0 by their impressive Serie A opponents Atalanta, who exposed the deficiencies in a Liverpool side showing six changes from their weekend draw with Manchester United, and lacking the rhythm and composure that we usually see from them.
Klopp was very open in his post-match comments, saying: “I didn’t like our tactical positioning in possession. We gave them one situation by passing the ball there, then everyone was chasing another guy. We scored one that was offside but it was a bad game from us. Atalanta had a good game, scored three goals and deserved to win.
“A lot of performances tonight were really ‘oops, wow, I didn’t know they could play like that.’ A lot of the players looked really alone in a lot of moments. It was really bad.”
Oops indeed. But who could Klopp have been referring to with that criticism? Well it wasn’t hard to spot.
The Reds boss made a triple change at half-time as he sought to find a way back into the game, and while the withdrawn Harvey Elliott was so unfortunate when his effort bounced back off the post and bar, and Curtis Jones is making his way back from injury, there was no such mitigation for the display of Kostas Tsimikas.
The Greek looked woefully out of form and fitness during what was a rare appearance from him, and he looked a world away from the player who filled in for Andy Robertson impressively for over two months following the Scot’s dislocated shoulder in October.
As well as Tsimikas, the display of Caoimhin Kelleher also left a lot to be desired. The Irishman has been fantastic in the prolonged absence of Alisson of course, but he might well have gone a game or two too far.
Luckily for Klopp, Alisson is returning to full training and Robertson is getting up to speed too. Those two simply have to come back into the starting XI for the remainder of the season as the Reds seek to rediscover a solidity that completely deserted them here.
Klopp rotated and was punished for it, but from hereon in – perhaps bar a Bergamo second leg he could now throw away – it’ll have to be first choice all the way.
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Olivia Martin is a dedicated sports journalist based in the UK. With a passion for various athletic disciplines, she covers everything from major league championships to local sports events, delivering up-to-the-minute updates and in-depth analysis.
