Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp clearly knows that Naby Keita is very much a work in progress.
Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp has admitted to The Echo that he is expecting some under-par showings from Naby Keita in certain halves during the final few months of the season.
The Guinea international has endured a poor first season on Merseyside after completing a £53 million move from Leipzig last summer [The Times].
But he is slowly but surely finding his feet and Saturday’s 3-0 win over Bournemouth was his fourth successive Premier League appearance for Liverpool – the first time he has strung together that amount of games in a row.
The 24-year-old was particularly poor in the first half in last week’s 1-1 draw at West Ham United, before growing into the game after the break, with Klopp admitting that he ‘wasn’t good’ overall that night.
And although the German manager is anticipating many more hot-and-cold displays from the big-money signing, he says it is ‘completely normal’.
“The second half against West Ham was a big step but nobody really realised it because nobody was happy with the game and nobody talked about this,” he told The Echo
“Maybe people liked to talk more about the negative things from the first half with Naby. It was not good at West Ham, that’s no problem. We will probably see a couple of bad halves from Naby in the future, that’s completely normal.”
Keita continues to show flashes of what he is capable of, and grabbed a wonderful pre-assist for Mo Salah’s goal on Saturday.
He released Roberto Firmino with a brilliant eye-of-the-needle pass, before the Brazilian cut back for Salah to score.
The more Keita provides eye-catching moments like that, the more Klopp will think he has signed a very good player.
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