Alan Shearer has dismissed Jurgen Klopp’s assessment that Manchester United came to Anfield just to defend.
Liverpool could only manage a 0-0 draw with old rivals United, with Man City’s win in the late kick off, pushing the champions down to fourth in the table.
United arguably had the better of the chances and the Reds were indebted to goalkeeper Alisson for his late save from Paul Pogba’s point-blank strike.
Following the game Klopp hinted that Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s side had only come to keep them out, as they failed to score again.
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“The worst thing you can face in football is to play against a side with world-class players and they all defend with all they have. It is really difficult, it is the biggest challenge,” Klopp said.
“The way we understood the game, the way we felt the game, the way we read the moments were really good. But it is not exactly how it should be so we have space for improvement, absolutely. We will keep working on that.”
However, analysing the game on Match of the Day 2, Shearer disputed Klopp’s verdict, suggesting the visitors should have left Anfield with all three points.
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“I wouldn’t agree with that (suggestions from Klopp that United came to defend), I thought they grew into the game,” Shearer said.
“First half they defended deep and got men behind the ball. But second half I thought they were the better team, Man United. They had two exceptional chances and with those chances, should have won the game.”
The shutout against United was Liverpool’s third Premier League game in a row without scoring.
But despite their struggles in front of goal, the Reds boss claimed his players were doing nothing differently and were simply guilty of missing too many chances.
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“No, there is nothing fundamentally different, it’s just the result is different. We try and we don’t score or we try and we score – that’s a big difference, to be honest,” he added.
“It’s not that we ignore the fact and just hope it will be good again. We did that but the only possibility you have to score goals is to create situations and to be ready to fail and to do it again.
“That’s a massive difference between when you are flying and you score with pretty much each chance you have because then you deal with the missed chances better.”
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