Jurgen Klopp on Liverpool friendly defeat to Lyon

Jurgen Klopp has insisted that his players will use the friendly defeat to Olympique Lyonnais in Dubai as a ‘learning curve’.

Liverpool were beaten 3-1 by the Ligue 1 side in their first of two friendlies before the restart of club football after the World Cup.

Fabio Carvalho scored a first minute opener for the Reds before a goal from Bradley Barcola and a brace from Alexandre Lacazette earned Lyon the win.

Speaking to the club’s official website after the game, manager Klopp said: “The start of the game from us was really good, I liked a lot of parts in the first half. I saw what we were working on in the training sessions so far. Really aggressive, played well, good connected, could have scored a second one and then we concede the equaliser with a misunderstanding between Robbo and Caoimhin. Not cool – but can happen, obviously.

“Second half we had to change a lot [and] with all the things we did in training it was clear 60 minutes is the maximum what anybody can play. And then we were really young and not well organised anymore. Let me say it like this, when we lost the ball then it ended up in front of our goal.

“Every ball we lost was a counter-attack and was pretty much a big chance, that’s of course not how it should look, but that’s a learning curve and we will use this game to learn from.”

Klopp also discussed Joel Matip’s return to fitness after the game. The centre back has had his injury issues this season, missing five games with a calf injury, but was able to get some minutes under his belt in Dubai:

“[Matip’s return is] Very important, absolutely very important. Yeah, so far he did pretty much everything in training. There was one session where we got advice to rest him a little bit, but it was not from him, it was from the medical department, [so] that’s what we did.

“Apart from that he could do everything. Looked good today, 45 minutes was again what we were allowed to use him. That’s what we did. That’s good. Naby’s first 30 minutes, I think, for a while. Very helpful as well, important position, important player, so that was [what] we should only use him [for], 30 minutes. I think against AC Milan next Friday they are probably able to play a bit longer.”