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Liverpool Echo
Liverpool Echo
Sport
Ian Doyle

Jurgen Klopp sends Liverpool 20-year warning ahead of Carabao Cup final against Chelsea

Jurgen Klopp believes his Liverpool side must win more silverware if they want to be remembered as Anfield greats in 20 years.

The Reds will aim to complete the first leg of a potential quadruple when they take on Chelsea in the Carabao Cup at Wembley on Sunday.

The majority of the squad were part of the team that claimed the Champions League, UEFA Super Cup and FIFA Club World Cup in 2019 and the Premier League the following year.

Liverpool go into the weekend just three points behind league leaders Manchester City, in a strong position to reach the Champions League quarter-finals and having progressed to the last 16 of the FA Cup.

And Klopp admits there will be a sense of regret if his players don’t lift more trophies during his tenure.

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“This team, we all know that in the moment the people are really happy,” said the Reds boss.

“But in 20 years if you want to talk about this team, I would not be surprised if people would then say if we don’t win anything any more, they’ll say ‘yeah they were good, but they should have won more’.

“That’s why we should try now to win a few things. And the next chance, the best chance we have this weekend, is against Chelsea when it’s really tricky.”

Klopp added: “The consistency the boys showed over the years is absolutely crazy. There is only one problem – there is another team who is even more consistent just that little bit, and that's City.

“It's not a problem for me, it's just in general because you would talk about this team (Liverpool) completely differently if the other team would not be there.

“And, by the way, City would have won the league the one year we won it and probably the Champions League the previous year as well, because we kicked them out.”

Liverpool have won only one major final at the new Wembley since it opened in 2007 when beating Cardiff City to win the League Cup in 2012.

Under Klopp they lost the League Cup final against City in 2016 and successive Community Shields in 2019 and 2020, all after a penalty shoot-out.

And asked if his team deserved a showpiece win at the national stadium, the Reds boss said: “We will try with everything to have this Wembley moment. We cannot do more. The boys deserve pretty much everything.

“But how can we say Chelsea don’t deserve it? It depends on the game we play. You have to deserve it in the game.

“We can’t sit here and talk about it like it’s already ours, Chelsea has exactly the same chance.

“They won the Club World Cup (earlier this month) and we know how that feels and how great that is. They are desperate to put another in the trophy room.”

Liverpool go into the game on the back of a 6-0 home Premier League win over Leeds United which extended their run of form to just two defeats in 49 games since being beaten at Real Madrid in the Champions League quarter-final last April.

Klopp, though, admits he was taken aback when recently told of his team’s remarkable consistency.

“The first problem that I have, when I heard the number maybe two games ago that we'd only lost two games since Madrid, is it didn't feel like that for a second,” he said. “Not for a second.

“My first thought was; 'Well, how many draws?' It feels like 25 or something. I couldn't believe that we'd only lost twice.

“Then you have to find the games we lost – West Ham and Leicester. It makes no sense. We were not brilliant in those two games but we should not have lost them, but we did.

“I think a good skill I have is that I cannot remember these kind of things because I couldn't be bothered how we played last week. We need to win this game and then let's go again.

“That's what I mean when I say my job is to make it clear to the boys that the most important game we play ever is the next one. Because we have nothing else to do and, thank God, the boys listen.

“Even the games we lost there was not a lack of intensity. We fought, we were bad maybe but we fought, and that's really important. That helped us through these years. The character of these boys made the story.”

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