Don’t talk about it, be about it is Jurgen Klopp’s (paraphrased) motto for Liverpool’s trophy ambition this season.
It’s a good stance to take– what’s the point in saying how ambitious your side is? Everyone will say that. Klopp wants to show the world how good and how hungry his team is. Ahead of their third round League Cup tie against Derby County, Klopp says they wouldn’t be in it if they didn’t want to win it.
“It makes only sense to be part of a competition, especially cup competitions, with the aim to win it – there is no other reason why we should start in it,” said Klopp, via Liverpoolfc.com. “It’s not that we have nothing else to do – we could train today and tomorrow, which would be very important, but [instead] we have a very competitive game against a strong side.”
Of course, it’s not the first item on the agenda that they work towards everyday but it’s important nonetheless.
“It’s not that we say every day we want to win the EFL Cup, but it’s a very important tournament and we showed last year that it’s really exciting to be part of it,” said Klopp. “We had a lot of great games and being part of it helped us a lot, to learn more about each other and how we react in specific situations. That’s what we want to do again.”
Last season, Liverpool stormed into the final that they lost in penalties to Manchester City. However unlucky that would’ve been, it was a learning experience.
“The final was a great experience – always being part of a final is great, but only really great when you win it. That’s what we had to accept after the game, but the final was good for us,” said Klopp. “We start in this competition to win it, but it’s not important to talk about it – it’s more important to show it on the pitch again. It will be a real challenge.”
After dancing around the questions a bit, Klopp says he doesn’t want to talk about winning trophies. He wants to win them.
“It’s not about talking about it [winning trophies], it’s about doing everything so that you come as close as possible to get them,” said Klopp. “Whatever I could say now, nothing would change but everybody can imagine that we are really ambitious in all competitions – it’s the only reason we do it [compete in them] – but it doesn’t help to talk about it.
