Jurgen Klopp was involved in a touchline bust-up with Tony Pulis as Liverpool scrambled a 2-2 draw on a dramatic day at Anfield.
Liverpool’s boss celebrated provocatively in front of his West Bromwich counterpart after Divock Origi scored a 96th-minute equaliser.
The pair had to be separated and did not shake hands at the final whistle, with Pulis heading straight down the tunnel.
But the row continued as West Brom coach Mark O’Connor made a point of following Klopp and offering a hand. The German accepted it but they exchanged words before Klopp pulled away.
Klopp then joined his team on the pitch, getting them to hold hands in front of the Kop and lift their arms in the sort of celebration normally reserved for winning a trophy.
Klopp’s fury stemmed from Craig Gardner’s heavy tackle on Dejan Lovren in the 74th minute. The midfielder won the ball and was not booked, but he followed through on the Croatia defender and Klopp said: ‘He played the
ball a millisecond before he hit Dejan. It was like the whole game — on the edge of everything.’
Lovren needed five minutes of treatment before being carried off and receiving stitches in his right knee. He left Anfield on crutches and will have a scan today to discover whether he has suffered any ligament or bone damage.
Speaking about his clash with Pulis, Klopp said: ‘We had some words in the game. Usually I shake hands but it was not a friendly game.
‘We hope Dejan’s injury is not too serious. We have to wait for the scan. It is a cut, everybody can see that.’
Pulis denied he had taken offence at Klopp’s reaction to the late equaliser but, after a game which saw no yellow cards, he accused Liverpool’s players of making the worst challenges and defended West Brom’s tactics.
Pulis said: ‘If you are going into challenges, the two worst ones in the game were James Milner’s on Gardner and Martin Skrtel’s on Salomon Rondon. I have just watched the tape back of those two.
‘Gards has actually played the ball (in tackling Lovren). The others? Skrtel has gone right over the ball. Luckily Salomon moved out of the way. So have a look at them before you start talking about our players.’
On Klopp, Pulis added: ‘He is animated. I have been animated all my life on the bench. I have no problems with that.
‘We have come here and tried to be resilient. I don’t think there was a booking during the game.
‘The big disappointment was that they got that goal.’
It was a remarkable end to a game full of drama which Liverpool looked set to lose after they made a series of defensive mistakes that led to goals for Craig Dawson — capitalising on an error by goalkeeper Simon Mignolet — and Jonas Olsson either side of half time.On another day, West Brom would have won. Olsson had a ‘goal’ disallowed for offside by Craig Pawson before half time following a conversation with his assistant Richard West. It was the correct decision but how it was reached mystified visiting boss Pulis.
‘The bigdisappointment is the linesman never put his flag up,’ said Pulis. ‘They tell me Olsson is offside, so why hasn’t he put his flag up but dragged the referee 50 yards across to talk to him? That is disappointing.
‘We will speak to the officials to find out why that is. If the flag goes up at the time, we accept everything.’ – Daily Mail