Jurgen Klopp Bemoans Absence Of Fans At Anfield After Six Straight Premier League Home Losses

Jurgen Klopp has named the absence of supporters as the pivotal factor for Liverpool's wretched form at Anfield.

The iconic stadium has been a fortress in recent years, with the Reds embarking on a remarkable 68-game unbeaten home run that started back in April 2017.

That streak came to an end against Burnley in January and the struggling Premier League champions have lost a further five consecutive games on home soil - Brighton, Manchester City, Everton, Chelsea and Fulham all claiming three points at Anfield.

Much has been made of the Anfield atmosphere inspiring Liverpool's players on the pitch over the years and Klopp feels no fans being allowed in due to the COVID-19 pandemic has had a huge impact on his side.

"One of the main reasons is there's no crowd in, there's no doubt about that," Klopp said ahead of the visit of Aston Villa, as per Sky Sports.

"A lot of teams have that problem. Apart from that the reason why we didn't win home games is we didn't play well enough, not in all of them.

"There were some home games when we lost where I thought in other times even without crowd, we would or should have won this game for sure but we didn't.

"Now we have a losing streak of four home games? Six home games in a row - wow! That's long. We have to change. But it's not how can I change that in training or whatever, we have to bring ourselves in the right mindset.

"For a long time, nobody could really explain why we were are so strong at home, at least results-wise. Now this is not easy to explain but the main reason why we are not exactly the same is we miss our supporters.

"That's how it is but that is not to change. We have played very good games without supporters at home and that's what we have to do now. We want to squeeze out of the season whatever we can get."

Klopp hit headlines following Liverpool's 3-1 Champions League quarter final first leg loss to Real Madrid when he had a dig at the Spanish side's stadium.

Due to work going on at the Santiago Bernabeu, Real are playing all home games at the 6,000 capacity Alfredo Di Stefano Stadium.

Klopp called the B team's arena a "training ground", and then after the game, was quoted as saying, "It was strange tonight because of the stadium and the situation but Anfield is at least a proper stadium - that will be good for us."

Klopp's comments were deemed to be disrespectful by many and in response, Real boss Zinedine Zidane said his team are "proud" to play at the stadium.