Georginio Wijnaldum is confident that Liverpool can bounce back from some poor results in pre-season and put in a strong performance against Manchester City in the Community Shield on Sunday.
Liverpool have won just two of their six pre-season games so far, most recently tasting defeat against Carlo Ancelotti's Napoli at Murrayfield. Yet despite this shaky form, Wijnaldum remains confident that the Reds will be able to put things right before facing City.
Speaking to the club's official website, when asked whether Liverpool could bounce back against the Citizens', the 28-year-old stated: "that's what we've got to do."
He went on to say that: "It’s all about making minutes as much as possible, but also to get the results. The season already starts [on Sunday] so the result and the performance, it’s important for us to get confidence and to keep on going."
The Community Shield will be the first time that the Liverpool and Man City have met since the Sky Blues secured the title on the final day of the 2018/2019 season, and many expect the two sides to be involved in a similarly engrossing race for the top spot this campaign.
However, Liverpool's attempts to unseat City at the summit have got off to a rocky start in pre-season.
Defeats to Borussia Dortmund, Sevilla and most recently Napoli have been described as 'painful' by Wijnaldum.
Speaking about the Napoli game in particular, he said: "It was not our best game. I think it was a real poor performance from the team, the things that we normally do right with pressing, playing football [and] creating chances we didn’t do and they were quite good."
Jürgen Klopp will be hoping for a far better performance against Man City on Sunday and will be boosted by the fact that Xherdan Shaqiri and Naby Keita should both be fit for the game, after they sustained injuries whilst on international duty.
Source :
90min
