Emre Can says Liverpool’s bad defending is ‘definitely a fact’ when quizzed on failure to buy

Liverpool’s Emre Can has been speaking to the German media over the international break, and SportBild have published an interview with the Anfield midfielder.

Fans will be relieved to know that Can hasn’t reiterated his comments about Juventus interest being an honour, but then SportBild were more interested in a different line of questioning.

The German magazine believe Jurgen Klopp is receiving an awful lot of criticism from Premier League pundits, specifically for Liverpool’s defending and failure to improve that area of the pitch over the summer.

Embed from Getty Images

SportBild put it to Can that much of the criticism revolves around Liverpool’s failure to address the issue during the window, and the midfielder responded: “It’s definitely a fact that we have recently defended badly and conceded too many goals. But I still believe that when we scored goals, we won the games. Then nobody was speaking about the defence.”

They were Emre, they were.

Asked what Jurgen Klopp makes of Liverpool’s bad patch, Can explained: “The coach himself says we didn’t play badly. We almost dominated the opponents in all games and were the better team. Jurgen Klopp is convinced that only the necessary luck is missing to return to winning.”

If Klopp is trying to keep his players optimistic then that approach may be fine, but if the German genuinely believes only luck stands in Liverpool’s way then it’s going to continue to be an up and down journey.

On the criticism Klopp is receiving, Can said: “At Liverpool, however, nobody questions the coach. Jurgen Klopp is a top-top trainer.”