Klopp takes aim at media coverage of Salah’s message to Liverpool fans
Jurgen Klopp has taken aim at the media over coverage of Mohamed Salah’s tweet after Liverpool missed out on next season’s Champions League.
Manchester United’s 4-1 victory over Chelsea handed Erik ten Hag’s side the remaining place in next season’s competition after Newcastle booked their spot on Monday.
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It leaves 2019 winners Liverpool banished to the Europa League after an inconsistent campaign that has left them playing catch up for the most part.
Salah took to social media on Thursday night to apologise to the club’s supporters, claiming Champions League qualification is the ‘bare minimum’ for the club.
“I’m totally devastated,” he wrote to his 18 million Twitter followers. “There’s absolutely no excuse for this.
“We had everything we needed to make it to next year’s Champions League and we failed. We are Liverpool and qualifying to the competition is the bare minimum.
“I am sorry but it’s too soon for an uplifting or optimistic post. We let you and ourselves down.”
Salah has drawn criticism from some sections of the media who believe he shouldn’t have posted the tweet in the aftermath of United’s victory.
But the Liverpool boss backed his forward and had a few choice words for sections of the media.
“I’m a bit worried by the headlines you create with the words I say to be honest, so do me a favour and try your best,” Klopp told reporters ahead of Sunday’s trip to Southampton
“In the world of social media, so many bad things happen constantly and I don’t think that was one of them.
“It’s a completely normal description of the situation, of his feelings. In that moment, he’s right, it’s not a moment to send any optimistic messages.
“I saw Mo an hour ago in the canteen and he was smiling. He wasn’t in a bad mood.”
Klopp revealed that following his side’s 1-1 draw with Aston Villa last weekend, he was pessimistic that both Newcastle and Manchester United would slip up, and had already drawn a line under the race for the top four.
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The Reds boss also gave a frank overview of the season and despite mentions of his side’s failings, Klopp placed emphasis on the positives including the Reds’ current ten-game unbeaten run.
He added: “This wasn’t a historically good season, we are not happy with it. We made mistakes. We couldn’t deliver often enough, we weren’t consistent enough.
“But since the Dubai winter break, the amount of points we collected was pretty good and if we could have done that over the whole season we would have been in a different place.
“There are reasons for optimism [ahead of next season] because of the things we showed in the last few weeks.”
