Slot on Liverpool's 1-0 derby win to maintain their 12-point lead at top of Premier League

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Slot on Liverpool's 1-0 derby win to maintain their 12-point lead at top of Premier League  02/04/2025  Anfield, Liverpool, UK

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00:00Hard-fought definitely but that was not a surprise. Nine games in a row when

00:08beaten Everton. Hardly ever conceded a goal, hardly ever conceded a chance.

00:12Defend with 10 players apart from Beto in and around our 18-yard box with

00:18players like Tarkovsky and Braithwaite that is almost of no use to bring a

00:22cross in because they had every ball away. So a team that is difficult to play

00:28against because they're also a threat in a counter-attack with Beto and every

00:33throw-in they get, every free-kick they get against us, they get quite a lot of

00:37free-kicks. That was a joke. You have to defend that and from that sometimes...

00:45You didn't like that joke, did you?

00:49And that's what makes it so difficult. So what I like much more today than I

00:54liked it at Goodison Park. At Goodison Park we had ball possession but we only had

00:57ball possession with our centre-backs and our full-backs and today only the

01:02first half. I think if I say 10-15 times that Lucio Dia was

01:061-1 against O'Brien, I don't even think I exaggerated. But to have that

01:12is one thing, to create a chance is a second thing. So that's why we had to be

01:16there so many times, so many times, so many times and you're hoping that one

01:20time then can be enough and it was with Diogo's goal.

01:27How pleased were you with his performance tonight and getting the goal as well?

01:36Very pleased. He was close to it already in the first half, I think it was after

01:40seven, eight or nine minutes. But it was not a surprise that they blocked that

01:44shot because they're a defensively incredibly strong team. So yeah, for him

01:54to come up in the second half he had two of these moments as well and the

01:57other moment was blocked. But now he found just a bit of space and he scored

02:04the goal, which was nice for him but nice for us and with us I mean his

02:11teammates, the staff and the fans.

02:15Were you surprised also that Tarkovsky wasn't sent off for what followed?

02:23Let me first say that I don't want to comment about the situation because so

02:29many people already commented on that and even people that are not liking

02:34Liverpool a lot and they were all so clear and obvious what the

02:38decision should have been, there is no need for me to comment on that. Was I

02:44surprised? No.

03:00It's not something that came up last week, it's something that I've thought

03:05about, we've thought about for a bit longer. First half of the season were

03:10already moments where I talked about this with him, that I think he's able to

03:15do this in games or in moments of games. But three full-backs were injured, Trent

03:22Alexander-Arnold, Conor Bradley and Joe Gomez. So then it's a choice of playing

03:26a centre-back over there, Gerald did quite okay in that position to be fair

03:29and he would have helped us with set-pieces but we felt that if we

03:35would have a chance to win the game we had to play better with

03:38the ball than we did in the away game. So it's a risk to play a midfielder

03:42over there maybe, but I knew that he could help with his creativity in this

03:47position because that's what you lack of course when Trent is not playing for

03:52you. And he did very well defensively also, so strong performance from him, like

04:00from the whole team and nice to have an extra option in that position because

04:06three of them are injured in that position.

04:08The Premier League match-up says the VAR check took 10 seconds, is that something you're surprised about?

04:18Is that something I'm surprised about?

04:20Yeah, like groups go such a short amount of time...

04:23I don't mind if they take 10 seconds or a minute. If you are a VAR and you think

04:28it's no red card, yeah then you can also say it in 10 seconds, you don't have to

04:31wait for me to look at it a minute. So yeah, it's a human being that makes the

04:38decision, so the referee makes the decision, the human being that makes the decision over there.

04:42So I don't mind if they take 10 seconds or a minute or two minutes or three

04:47minutes, they should take the right decision. And if I hear all the

04:53commands, people don't think they made the right decision, which they fortunately

04:58did with the offside goal, which was not offside according to the rules.

05:02Do I like the rule? No, I don't like the rule. I think it's a rule that is not

05:07helping the team that wants to attack, because normally we always go to the

05:12half-way line, they kick the ball long, the striker is in an offside position and

05:15my centre-backs feel like, oh, I had the ball away. I always tell the

05:20linesman, was it offside? He said, no, he's not interfering. So I hate that rule, but the

05:26execution of the rule was fortunately for us today. Well done in that situation.

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