07:21

Here’s a hot take on Jurgen Klopp’s press conference:

In shock news, Jurgen Klopp has ridiculed Gary Neville’s suggestion that Liverpool should improve their Premier League title prospects by treating the Champions League lightly.

Last season’s Champions League runners-up open their campaign at home to Paris Saint Germain on Tuesday and, though Klopp admits he must rotate with seven games to play in 22 days, it will not be to dismiss the competition that Liverpool have won five times.

When Neville’s proposal was explained to the Liverpool manager at Melwood this morning, he replied: “How should that work? What do we do? We don’t play Champions League or what? Gary should come over and tell me exactly how that would work. How do you prepare a game and not focus on it? You bring your kids in the Champions League? That would be funny.

“I don’t know what he means with that, to be honest. We have to play football. A lot of people watch our games when we play Champions League and that’s our job that we do the best we can do in all these games. That’s what we try. I don’t know exactly what it means but to focus on one competition can only be if maybe you are already out of the competition nearly.

“If it’s late in the season that you see you have a chance to do that or do this and all that stuff. Last year, for example, we had no chance to focus on one competition because we had to qualify for the Champions League and I don’t think that even Gary Neville would have said, ‘Quarter-finals of the Champions League, let City win.’ It doesn’t work like this.

“I don’t want to be too critical because I don’t know exactly how he said it but sitting in an office and talking about football is completely different to doing the job, to be honest. But it’s an opinion. What did he say about Manchester United in that case? The club he’s more interested in. Nothing?”