In the tense situation in the backline for Jurgen Klopp, an emergency defender stood up to help Liverpool achieve victory over West Ham.
Liverpool head coach Jurgen Klopp applauded defender Nat Phillips following his presence in the backline on Saturday. However, the German boss does not think that the emergency defender is a special player.
Phillips received his first Premier League start alongside Joe Gomez against the strong West Ham side. And in some unfortunate events during the recent weeks, the Reds lost their major defenders because of injuries. These include Virgil van Dijk, Fabinho, and Joel Matip.
Klopp’s men displayed a resilient performance after a comeback following Pablo Fornals’ goal early in the first half for the Hammers. Subsequently, goals came from Mohamed Salah and super-substitution Diogo Jota to grab the three points.
Moreover, Phillips played for Stuttgart in the Bundesliga on a loan deal. Nevertheless, Klopp expressed his happiness to see the youngster come forward in crisis situations.
“He’s a brilliant guy, smart guy, intelligent, everything. He’s not easy on the eye, he’s not Messi but who cares?” the manager joked to Match of the Day.
“In the air, he’s a monster! He was incredible.
“For the first game, I think everyone can imagine how nervy that must be after a long wait. It’s a crazy story, three years ago he was on his way to America to college.
“Twelve Championship teams wanted him and to me, it was clear he was going, and I was fine with that – and it didn’t work out for whatever reason, and it’s great! Tonight he was spot on, helped the team incredibly.”
Jota all the way.
Klopp was delighted though, with Jota’s performance as he came off the bench to score the late winner.
“We fought really hard to sign him. We didn’t need to convince him too much, but we had to fight for it,” he added.
“He’s an exceptional talent. He has the speed, physicality, technique, he’s both-footed… He’s much better than I thought he would be and that’s really impressive.”
“We had a lot of good football – not 500 chances or whatever but enough. It’s a real challenge for the concentration levels, and we did it. I don’t want to see us in a moment be brilliant because it’s not possible, I want to see us dig in and we did that, and I’m so, so happy.”
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