Jurgen Klopp found himself stepping in to separate Darwin Nunez and Pep Guardiola in the immediate aftermath of Liverpool’s 1-1 draw at Manchester City, although both managers downplayed the incident during the post-match discussions.
Liverpool’s Trent Alexander-Arnold salvaged a point with a low drive after Erling Haaland had opened the scoring for the champions, achieving the fastest milestone of 50 Premier League goals in the process. The outcome left the two teams only a point apart in the league table, with Liverpool’s resilience frustrating the home side, who had a Ruben Dias goal disallowed when the score was 1-0.
However, attention shifted swiftly to a reported exchange between Nunez and Guardiola after the final whistle. Klopp, along with other members of Liverpool’s coaching staff, stepped in to mediate the situation.
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Klopp addressed the incident in his post-match press conference, stating, “I’m not sure I’m the one who should explain it, to be honest, because I was absolutely not involved – surprisingly! I love them both, so I tried to calm the situation down without knowing 100 percent what happened because I didn’t understand a word. That’s it. I really think it’s nothing more than what’s already sorted, to be honest. It’s emotional. Pep wants to win, we want to win. Both didn’t win, so there’s obviously nobody really happy, and then these things can happen.”
Guardiola also downplayed the incident when speaking to the media, stating, “Nothing happened. He [Klopp] is stronger than me. Nothing happened. It’s not frustration. I’m really pleased. If you talk about that in the second question of the press conference, you are not on my good side. Maybe for the last question, I’ll answer, but nothing happened.”
Klopp also told BBC Sport how pleased he was to come away from the Etihad Stadium with a point, admitting his side weren’t at their best but did what was required to come away from a difficult game with a share of the spoils.
“If we had played really well, we could have won. This is a really tough place to come and it is a not a coincidence they have won I don’t know how many in a row at home. They are a super team,” he said.
“When we had our football moments, we immediately created [chances]. Did we do that often enough? No. Can we play better? Definitely. And we will. But for today, this was a super important experience for the group.
“It has been a tough week for the boys and then coming here to play a game against a team that really makes you suffer is not cool. It is difficult to stay in the game, but we had our moments and I like that a lot. It is a good point and I am absolutely fine with it.”