"It looked like we felt under pressure" - Jurgen Klopp reacts to Liverpool's 0-0 first-leg draw against 10-man Arsenal in the Carabao Cup semi-final 

Liverpool were held to a frustrating goalless draw by a 10-man Arsenal side in the first-leg match of their Carabao Cup semi-final clash last night. Although Liverpool went into the game without their key attackers Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane, not many would've expected a 0-0 result by the end of the game.

Arsenal were dealt a massive blow when Granit Xhaka was sent off as early as the 24th minute, leaving the Gunners handicapped for more than an hour. However, Liverpool simply failed to capitalize on the advantage and manager Jurgen Klopp was understandably frustrated.

As per SB Nation, Klopp spoke in an interview following the final whistle and said:

“First and foremost, I don’t think even you saw this for the first time in the history of football – things like this happen.

“Our situation - and I said it before and it’s not an excuse, it’s an explanation -[meant] for obvious reasons we had to change the line-up tonight. I really liked the way we started in the game, I saw absolutely everything we wanted to see in the beginning. Front-footed, lively, direct in the right moments, we switched it in the right moments. We started in the game like we wanted to start and then there was the red card and then we play against a low block.

“Against a low block with the most finely-tuned team is difficult and obviously we are not – then on top of that, we made a few wrong decisions, we felt too much rushed, it looked like all of sudden we felt under pressure, which doesn’t make sense but it looked for me a little bit like that. It is a typical situation,” Klopp said.

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Arsenal will host Liverpool for the second-leg Carabao Cup semi-final match on 20th January

Liverpool v Arsenal - Carabao Cup Semi Final First Leg

The Liverpool boss was also questioned about the second-leg match against Arsenal, scheduled to be played in a week, to which he said:

“I have no idea what Arsenal will do when we face them, we will see that. It is not in my mind in the moment – my mind is already Brentford, so from Monday on you can ask me these thing of things about what we will do there.

“As I said, we know we can play better and we know we have to play better and that’s what we will do, what we will work on, that’s clear. A lot of things I liked, but the general outcome was not good enough, that’s the truth of this game and we have to accept this for the moment and from here we go.”