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José Mourinho claimed the “best lost team” after a late header from Roberto Firmino at Anfield gave Liverpool a 2-1 win against Tottenham to claim the Premier League title.
While Jürgen Klopp characterized a victory that displaced Spurs as leaders as “really special”, Mourinho also criticized the German’s sideline behavior, speculating that he would have been sent off if he “grabbed” the board from the fourth official as he claimed that did its opposite number.
Liverpool’s victory left 66 home league matches undefeated and takes them to 25 points after 13 games, three more than previous leaders Tottenham. As Liverpool dominated the match, in the second half the visitors hit a post through Stephen Bergwijn and Harry Kane missed with a point-blank header. Son Heung-min’s goal in the 33rd minute tied Mohamed Salah’s first goal for Liverpool.
“I told [Klopp] the best team lost and they didn’t agree, but that’s their opinion, ”said Mourinho. “If I behave like him on the touchline, I don’t stop there. That’s [only] animated? Do you want me to take the board with added time from the fourth official and see what happens to me? For some reason I am different. “
Unsurprisingly, Klopp had a different opinion. “The victory was absolutely deserved,” he said. “They are a superior team, a counterattack monster, so you have to be very focused and since they don’t want the ball too much, you have to play around them and keep them busy. We did it very, very well. What a wonderful goal to win, a nice corner [from Andy Robertson] and a great header from Bobby. “
The Liverpool manager added: “[Mourinho] He didn’t tell me anything about my behavior on the touchline. I thought you said the best team lost. It didn’t get hot at all. I thought he was joking, but he wasn’t. That’s it.”
Mourinho regretted his team’s rejected opportunities when Spurs lost for the first time in the league since day one of the season against Everton. “You have to kill a match of this dimension, and the game was there,” he said. “First we have Stephen Bergwijn’s face to face with the goalkeeper. Then we have the corner and Harry’s header, plus other counter positions. “
However, he was happy with the overall display. “The team was brilliant,” Mourinho said. “Today Liverpool did not seem like a champion team, European champion, world champion, that difference was not on the field. Even a draw wouldn’t have been the best taste – we had him there to kill him, but we missed the chance. We were so close to winning – a draw would be a bad result, so you can imagine how we feel about a loss.
“It was a very good performance, of course there were some mistakes, some things to improve. My team told me that they were right when I said that from the beginning of the season we go to every game to win. We played against the champions in their stadium and we had the best chances to win.
Having previously described his team as “just a pony” in the title race, Mourinho also insisted that he now feels comfortable describing Tottenham as steadfast in their quest for the title. “The first thing he does to the title contenders is to go to each game to win it with that ambition and I promise you that the ambition is there,” he said. “If in a game you see that we are not trying to win, it is not that we do not want to, it is because the rival pushes us into different situations.”
Liverpool’s dominance was underlined by their 200 passes in the final third to the Spurs’ account of just 19 with Klopp targeting Mourinho and his team for their lack of adventure. “If you ask me now, I can’t remember the 19th. That’s right. But it’s okay. Different approaches, different ways of playing, ”he said.
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“It was one of our best performances, quite special: three massive points. It’s the respect guys deserve, or earned, that [Spurs] think, ‘Okay, sit deep against them like this.’ We have to deal with it. Of course they had chances, they are a world class team, they are outstanding.
“They will be at the top of the table until the end of the season because they are really good. But playing against them is a real challenge and playing like us is very special ”.
