Jurgen Klopp Hails His Liverpool Charges After 5-Star Masterclass Performance Away in Portugal

Liverpool took another step forward in their journey towards European success as they 

outclassed Porto in their 5-0 victory, and manager, Jurgen Klopp had nothing but praise for his side. 

The Reds boss claimed his side's performance was 'exactly as good as necessary' as a heroic hat-trick from Sadio Mane and stunning strikes from Mohammed Salah and Roberto Firmino give Liverpool a comfortable lead for the second leg at Anfield.

As quoted on the Liverpool FC official site, Klopp expressed his satisfaction with his side's performance.

He described the performance: "As a very good one. Exactly as good as necessary, so in the end it was a high result but I think everyone saw in the game all the moments when we were not as compact as we wanted to be and Porto was immediately strong. They had their moments and we scored fantastic goals in the right moment."

Liverpool appeared to be a goal-scoring machine as they sliced through the Porto defence at the Estádio do Dragão. The night saw Sadio Mane return to form and to the score sheet, being hailed as a hat-trick hero. 

"He gave the right answer. That’s good. I said to him after the last game ‘finally you’re back’ immediately after when we talked on the pitch. Tonight he showed it again what a fantastic player he is. 

"He was always important, he was always fantastic for us, even in his not-that-good moments. That’s a real quality if you are not 100 per cent and still scoring, maybe not that often but involved in goals, then that’s really important."

The Reds Champions League triumph also saw the 'Egyptian King' reach a goal-scoring milestone. Salah became the second fastest player in the club's 126-year history to net 30 goals for the club. Klopp summed up the Egyptian's impressive achievement in one word, "wow".

"That makes it even more exciting so congratulations Mo, but hopefully it won't stop.

"That he plays a good season, I recognise that already. But it’s of course very important for us. I think each goal was kind of a winner and that’s very important."

However, it wasn't just Liverpool's attack that showed quality on Wednesday as their calm and composed defence proved vital to their victory.

"Absolutely. We defended really well and that was most important tonight. Porto are top of the league here and you are not top of the league if you don’t play football, so it was clear they have clear movements, patterns, they know what to do in each moment. Good crosses, often an offensively-orientated team, so yes, defending was really important.

"Both centre-halves were really spot-on, both full-backs were spot-on. Robbo tonight, wow, what a performance. Sometimes you forget Trent’s age, so it was really, really good tonight. All the midfielders worked fantastic and then it’s most important that the three boys up front help us and they did tonight in an outstanding manner and I am very happy about that."

Whilst the Merseyside team's European masterclass sits them comfortably in a position to proceed to the quarter-finals, the German manager still believes there is work to be done.

"We came here to create the basis for the second leg at Anfield – and that’s what we did, not more, not less. As I said a few times, I am too long in the business to think anything is sorted before the final whistle. We owe our supporters at Anfield a 100 per cent performance and that’s what we want to deliver. That’s all."