Dejan Lovren has attributed Liverpool’s defensive improvement to a greater understanding throughout Jürgen Klopp’s team and believes his display against Borussia Dortmund showed he has learned from previous mistakes.
Barring the lapse that allowed Mats Hummels to equalise in Germany, Liverpool produced a resilient defensive display at the Westfalenstadion on Thursday to secure a 1-1 draw in the first leg of the Europa League quarter-final.
Lovren and Mamadou Sakho impressed in central defence against Thomas Tuchel’s side to subdue the African player of the year, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, and ensure there were limited opportunities for Dortmund. However, the Croatia international says credit is due to the team unit for improving under Klopp.
Liverpool’s £20m defender said: “It is good. We are a team, every guy is important – even the 25th guy in the stand. After a couple of games together it is much easier to understand each other and we hope to continue like that.
“Everyone had a great defensive record against Dortmund, from Origi to the goalkeeper. I think it was a great effort from all of us in defence and all it was missing was maybe Divock scoring the one-on-one against their goalkeeper at the end of the first half and it would have been a different game.”
As well as clinching a valuable draw and away goal in Dortmund, five Liverpool players avoided a booking that would have ruled them out of next Thursday’s second leg at Anfield, Lovren among them.
He said: “I just concentrated on my game and my defensive work and it was OK. I will do everything for my team but I think I have learned from my mistakes before with silly bookings. I think I am a little bit cleverer now. I am more experienced.”
