Philippe Coutinho slams Liverpool's shambolic defending against Tottenham
PHILIPPE COUTINHO has slammed Liverpool's shambolic defending against Tottenham.
Posted Tuesday, October 24, 2017 by Dailystar.co.uk
Liverpool star Philippe Coutinho was not happy with the Reds' defending against Tottenham
The Brazilian ace admits they paid the price for failing to heed the warnings from boss Jurgen Klopp about how Spurs would target them at Wembley.
Klopp said after their 4-1 defeat on Sunday that even he could have done better than some of his dozy defenders.
"They were goals that could have been avoided," said striker Coutinho.
"Starting from out wide, they ended up being silly goals.
"The manager said quite a lot about how they would try goals like that and, of course, in defence we have to play a decent game. We were in the game, but the third goal in the first half was a low."
In an error-strewn defensive display Klopp resorted to hauling off chief culprit Dejan Lovren after just 32 minutes.
The Croatian was not alone though with goalkeeper Simon Mignolet and defenders Joel Matip and Joe Gomez also guilty of howlers in the horror show.
But Coutinho insists everyone on the pitch had to share the blame.
"It's not just about the defence, it's about the whole team, because the first goal started out wide, where everyone is involved in defending, not just the wingers or full-backs," he told ESPN Brazil.
"We have to improve this as quickly as possible in order to win games, fight more, in more difficult games like this.
"That's what decides a 'classic', an important game, it's those balls, so you have to be more attentive.
"To concede in the first four minutes, that unsettled the whole team a bit. Then the next one was after 12 or 13 minutes.
"It's really difficult against a strong team when you start like that."
Liverpool have now conceded 15 goals in just five away games.
Cameroon star Matip – who was at fault for Spurs' third goal - added: "It cannot go like this.
"It cannot be that we concede that many goals away. I'm a defender and I should take care of this.
"We gave them the opportunity. It was not that they played the perfect ball with our mistakes. We have to take care of them and have to stop them."
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