Jurgen Klopp says Liverpool must ‘reinvent’ themselves after Napoli humbling

The Reds were hammered 4-1 in Italy as their Champions League campaign began with a whimper

Jurgen Klopp watched on as Liverpool were outplayed by Napoli (Getty Images)

Jurgen Klopp admitted Liverpool need to “reinvent” themselves after they crashed to a 4-1 defeat to Napoli in the Champions League.

The German accused his team of making it easy for Napoli and said their pressing was non-existent and he could not remember the last time they made it so simple for teams to break them down.

Liverpool have only won two of their first six Premier League games but Klopp felt a difficult start was no excuse for how poor their defending was.

“It looks like we have to reinvent ourselves,” he said. “Basic things were not there. We are not working as a team, it is not personal stuff or pointing [at each other]. In football there are always solutions.

“It is a difficult period, no doubt about that, but if you are not playing exceptionally well you still can defend on a really high level, We should be able to do that.

“It is not we have to invent a new kind of football; we have to improve, Everybody would be happy if we could play the stuff we used to play. Tonight was the least compact performance I saw from us for a long, long time. Napoli was really good but we made it easy for them.”

Napoli exposed Liverpool’s high defensive line but Klopp argued the troubles really came higher up the pitch as his side struggled in midfield.

He added: “A high line is a risk when you don’t have pressure on the ball. The problem is we never got close enough to put the opponent under pressure.”

Klopp was asked if, after Thomas Tuchel’s sacking, he feared a similar fate? “Not really but who knows?” he replied. “There are different kind of owners. Our owners are rather calm and expect from me to sort the situation and not expect that someone else will sort it. That is how they always saw it and on the day they change their thoughts they might tell me.”