Jurgen Klopp opened up on the half-time message he told his Liverpool players before they secured a 2-1 win at home to Ajax in the Champions League.
The Reds secured a first win of their Group A campaign on Tuesday night six days after a 4-1 defeat at Napoli as goals from Mohamed Salah and Joel Matip were enough to edge out the Dutch giants at Anfield.
After Salah had registered his third of the season, the Eredivisie side hit back through Mohammed Kudus to send the two teams in at the interval level. Klopp said he asked his players to up their pressing levels in the second period before Matip's late header gave the home side an important victory.
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“The story of the game is typical, not for our season so far because normally we are 1-0 down, more for the situation we are in," Klopp said. "We did a lot of good stuff and played a really good game, we had something like 25 shots, which is good against a strong side full of confidence, absolutely convinced about the way they play, and we caused them a lot of problems.
“Our high press was good, the midfield press was good. It could have been better in moments but it was generally good. And then, 1-0 up, you concede with the first chance of the opponent the equaliser.
“That’s what I mean, it’s typical, a proper setback. The reaction was okay, not perfect but okay. At half-time we told the boys that after the goal our pressing was not as convincing as before.
“Maybe in these moments you only talk about a few yards or one harder sprint, so it’s not a big difference but it makes a big difference, that’s what we tried to do in the second half. It was clear we had to keep playing football because for Ajax it was really tough to defend against us, they had to work a lot."
Klopp added: “You saw immediately after half-time there was a bit more aggression from their side, little fouls not harsh fouls but interruptions. But we did really well, we had these quick set-pieces, quick restarts with Thiago where we tried to make an advantage in these moments.
“Sometimes you have to wait a bit longer, but I think nobody was surprised it was a set-piece (for the winner) because our set-pieces were really good tonight and I have no idea why we didn’t score earlier from them because pretty much each set-piece was a threat, if I’m right.
“Great goal, then ball not in, the linesman raises a flag which I really don’t know why, maybe he saw first that the ball was in, and big celebrations. The face of Joel showed exactly how we all felt at this moment."
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