Jurgen Klopp said Liverpool are not a “kicking team” and criticised what he called “crazy decisions” following his side’s 2-1 defeat at Tottenham after receiving two red cards.
Curtis Jones was sent off in the 26th minute for a foul on Yves Bissouma when VAR directed referee Simon Hooper to the review screen after he had initially issued a yellow card. Substitute Diogo Jota was then dismissed in the second half after picking up two yellow cards in the space of two minutes for fouls on Spurs defender Destiny Udogie.
Those red cards took the club’s tally to four in seven Premier League games this season. Already this campaign, Virgil van Dijk has served a suspension for a red card in a 2-1 win at Newcastle while Alexis Mac Allister had a red card received in the 3-1 win against Bournemouth overturned on appeal.
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But after losing two players to red cards, and subsequent suspensions, at Spurs, Klopp queried both decisions. “The red card for Curtis, everyone in here [at the news conference] probably thinks red card, but I played football and you didn’t,” Klopp said, adding: “When you see it in slow motion, it looks horrendous, but in real time it doesn’t look bad. The game is in real time, but we judge it in slow motion. If they wouldn’t use slow motion, I’m sure we still wouldn’t agree on many situations.
“Curtis wasn’t even close to doing it on purpose. We are not a kicking team. How can Jota in this game go off the pitch with two yellow cards? The first he barely touched him and for sure not his fault. That is what is the problem. We have so many things. When did you last hear a game with 11 v. 9? And we were close to 11 v. 8! There were no horrible fouls. We were not kicking players or whatever. The boys made a super intense game of it, it is crazy how hard we fought.”
Liverpool also had a Luis Díaz goal controversially ruled out for offside when the game was 0-0, a decision that PGMOL later admitted was incorrect due to “significant human error.”