Jurgen Klopp said he is only interested in what Liverpool will do in the future, not where they have been going wrong, when he held his first pre-match media conference on Thursday (15 October).
The German, who replaced Brendan Rodgers at Anfield last week, takes charge of the team for the first time at Tottenham Hotspur in the Premier League on Saturday (17 October) and said he wanted his players to have more confidence.
Thats the feeling I want to give the players is that they can trust themselves. I told them of course I am here because LFC is a great club, but I am here because of them and I have the feeling I can help them. So, now we have to work together and I need their help of course, and if we dont dream of only success in each situation and prepare for problems in the game and strong enough to handle the situation then we can stay in the game, and if you can stay in the game then you can win the game.
At the end its only football and thats important, so all these guys are able to play really good football, thats what they did in their past and thats the reason they are here, and now we have to open our chest and then lets run and fight and shoot and all these things, and defend together and attack together, and all these things like in your best dream (what) football looks like, he added.
The former Borussia Dortmund coach is tasked with turning Liverpool back into contenders for major silverware – specifically a first English title since they collected their 18th in 1989-90.
Liverpool drew five and won one of their last six matches under Rodgers – counting their League Cup match with fourth-tier Carlisle United as a draw before their win on penalties – but go to Spurs with a good recent record against the London side.
Klopp takes over a team in 10th place and has promised full-throttle football at Anfield, although he has asked for patience and warned he is not a miracle worker as he looks to replicate his success in turning Dortmund into Bundesliga title winners and Champions League finalists.
Some things you can change like this, you can change mentality like this, change readiness like this. Thats all you can change, its not fixed that you cannot do more, you can change but to get really tuned as a team then that takes time but I am not interested in the problems we could have on Saturday, it is a really important game for us because of one point - after this game we know more, thats very important. I met two kinds of people last week, most of them say we can win the League, we can win the League, and the other guys look at me and ask what have you done, why are you here? Both are wrong and both are not interesting. We want to get back trust from outside and we want to get back confidence more and more and more and more, in our own skills and our own quality, and that needs sometimes more but sometimes less time, he said.
Liverpool have won the last five league games against Spurs including 5-0 and 3-0 wins at White Hart Lane in the last two seasons, but Spurs are in form. They are the only side in the league not to have lost since the opening day when they went down 1-0 at Manchester United, having won three and drawn four league games since.
