Jurgen Klopp has hailed his “exceptional” Liverpool side after they beat Aston Villa 3-1 at Villa Park, and backed striker Darwin Nunez to find goalscoring form sooner rather than later.
Mohamed Salah, Virgil van Dijk and Stefan Bajcetic were on the scoresheet with Ollie Watkins’ second-half goal for Aston Villa ultimately not enough to salvage anything from the game, and Klopp was full of praise for his side getting the result.
“Massively,” Klopp replied when asked how pleased he was with the result. “It was a top performance, a difficult game against Aston Villa. I think we played exceptional first half, Villa had their moments but we were really good, I liked what I saw.
“We could tell the boys at half-time where we could have done better and the only problem was the second half, we missed a little bit the last step, all of a sudden, and obviously Aston Villa were pushing hard, that’s normal in a home game, we knew that would happen. You have to get through these periods.”
Trent Alexander-Arnold played an incredible pass from midfield to find Andy Robertson, making a darting run into the box from Liverpool’s right flank, who then found Salah to tap home for the opener.
“I loved them all, but you are right,” Klopp said when asked which goal was most special. “The pass from Trent [Alexander-Arnold], I don’t know, I asked him after the game ‘did you want it?’ He said ‘yes!’
“Wow, incredible, and the turn as well, Robbo [Andy Robertson] off of the run, and then you need someone to finish, and obviously for Mo [Salah] it’s not too difficult. Sensational goal.”
Darwin Nunez failed to register a goal or an assist but made himself tough for Aston Villa’s players to handle.
The £64 million striker, whose price tag could rise to £85 million with add-ons, has managed to find the back of the net five times in the league so far, 13 goals shy of the league’s leading scorer Erling Haaland.
However, Klopp isn’t worried about Nunez’s form and believes it’s only a matter of time before he starts to find the net consistently.
“Incredible, what a game he played!” Klopp said. “Life is unfair [on Nunez not scoring], on the foot, it’s once inch, maybe less, if the ball goes in or not, and he will score, there’s no doubt about that.
“What he gives us is depth, each ball pretty much controlled at once, then play it in behind, that’s really tricky because he has power that’s incredible, and of course, he will score.
“I was in this situation many times before with strikers and everything will be fine, this game was exceptional.”
