Jurgen Klopp claimed last season s Champions League final showed why only the result matters as Liverpool prepare for another life-changer .
The Reds have reached European football s showpiece match for a second consecutive season and face Tottenham in Madrid on Saturday.
But Liverpool fell short against Real Madrid a year ago, losing a final in Kiev in which star man Mohamed Salah went off injured and Loris Karius made two dismal errors though it was later revealed the goalkeeper had suffered a bout of concussion during the contest.
Klopp insisted he recovered quickly from that setback yet pointed out that the nature of that defeat showed the result this weekend has far greater importance than the Reds performance.
I actually decided that night [in Kiev] that it would not really keep me, he told the Independent. You saw the game. It happened like it happened. What can you do?
Yes, disappointment, being sad, all that stuff. But when we arrived in England again, I was already over it. I was pretty much the only one, actually because I saw my family coming, and they didn t look like they were over it my friends, as well.
And I remembered standing in the queue for the flight in Kiev, all in tracksuits, heads down, waiting for the check-in, and I remembered: I want to come back. I want to do it again.
I didn t think at that moment that we would have the chance immediately next year. But now we have. And that s cool.
Estadio Metropolitano, Madrid
— Liverpool FC (@LFC)
You get over it. Years ago [in 2014 with Borussia Dortmund], we played the cup final against Bayern Munich, a tight game, 0-0.
We scored a goal, [but there was] no goal-line technology. Pretty much everyone in the stadium saw it, but the ref didn t. Extra-time: Bayern score one, everything opens up, they score a second one, done.
We didn t lose. But people don t want to hear that. People only care about the result.
Who spoke about the [Sergio] Ramos and Salah incident after the game if not us? Who said [Karius] had a concussion? People say, Ha ha, he had a concussion . But he had a concussion.
Five days after the final, he had 37 or 40 concussion points. But how can you use it? You only learn to sit back and accept all the things that happen around you. Deal with yourself. Don t expect any help.
I m not a frustrated person. You will not be interested after the final how the goals happened maybe a little bit, but for 10 minutes, then it s over.
For us, it can be a life-changer. That s the situation we are in.
