It may have been a trademark celebration but Jurgen Klopp insisted it was a reluctant one. There were three fist-pumps, in front of the Kop and in time-honoured fashion. There was a self-deprecating response. “I didn’t want to do the fist pumps but you never know when you can do it next,” laughed Klopp: he could not against Brighton or Brentford or Wolves, in some of the worst performances of his reign and what is shaping up as his poorest season in England.
Any victory might have prompted it. That Everton were the losers, that Liverpool played well, that there was a rousing atmosphere helped prompt Klopp to give his public what they wanted. “Whatever the crowd asked me I would have done except for getting rid of my clothes,” he said. “But it should be a thank you for them, not a torture.”
