Jurgen Klopp denies any of his players are divers as he shrugs off lingering Liverpool vs Arsenal controversy

Having waited 424 days to see Liverpool awarded a penalty at Anfield, they have now been given three in successive games

Jürgen Klopp has denied any of his players are divers, asking whether blood needs to be spilt to prove they, in fact, deserve penalties after Mohamed Salah was at the centre of what may have seemed to be another controversial refereeing decision in Liverpool’s favour during the destruction of Arsenal.

The Egyptian fell under the challenge of Sokratis Papastathopoulos on Saturday night before scoring the subsequent spot kick and the defender followed him into the tunnel to remonstrate before Virgil van Dijk intervened on behalf of his teammate.

Though the decision by Michael Oliver was proven to be the right one, the flashpoint came three days after Salah was accused of falling to the ground too easily against Newcastle, though similarly television replays revealed the contact between defender and attacker and explained – despite claims Salah should be banned – why the incident wasn’t pursued by the Premier League.

Having waited 424 days to see Liverpool awarded a penalty at Anfield, they have now been given three in successive games.

Klopp, who sprinted into the dressing room at the half time whistle, said that he was not aware of the confrontation involving Sokratis, a person he knows well having managed him at Borussia Dortmund.

“…of the few things I see in the English press is the ref watch on Sky after the game,” Klopp said.

“Not a lot of times have I thought, ‘That was a penalty,’ and then looked at it to find it was not the right decision. ‘Ah, good decision.’ Dermot Gallagher said [after the Newcastle game], ‘penalty.’ His arm was there. Do we need blood for a proper penalty? I think no. In that moment, if you don’t touch Mo and he makes the next step and shoots – and we know he’s pretty good at that…

“I haven’t seen it back [the incident involving Sokratis] and I have no clue about what happened around it but the ref really was close to it. We don’t have divers and that was not a dive. The other one is not a dive. The ref decides it. In the three and a half years we have had more penalties not given when they were penalties…”

Liverpool’s victory pushed them further ahead of the second placed team after Tottenham’s surprise defeat at home to Wolves. While not downplaying Liverpool’s chances of winning a first league title of 1990, Klopp was keen to maintain a sense of balance despite having helped steer his team to eight wins in a row through December.

Jurgen Klopp manager of Liverpool and Unai Emery manager of Arsenal (Getty Images)

“We play good football,” he admitted. “We do a lot of things in the right way and I see that. I have no problem saying that. It’s really brilliant…but after the game in the dressing room what I say, it didn’t sound like we won the game. Then at the end, ‘…and congratulations by the way, brilliant performance!’

“It’s just so hard to get in a situation like that. So difficult. It was so convincing in a lot of moments, ‘woah – that’s really good.’ You see so many things we did in pre-season, two weeks ago or last week. It’s all good. But sport is a season. We really only celebrate things when the season is over. Still the target was and the aim was at the start of the season to qualify for the Champions League.

“When that’s clear, we have to go for everything. We don’t deny or want to avoid something, it’s just too early. Our competitors are really good football teams. They’ve obviously result wise have had a rather average week. That can happen to everybody. We are still the challengers. We want to be as good as possible but for the moment, it’s really good.”