"Anyone who ever again says Sadio Mane is a diver is the biggest joke in the world" - Klopp defends his forward after loss to Southampton

Jurgen Klopp has leapt to the defence of Sadio Mane who has been criticised for being a diver. 

The Reds boss has stated that his forward is not a diver and should have had a penalty in Liverpool’s loss to Southampton.

The Reds slipped to a 1-0 defeat thanks to an early goal from Danny Ings at the St Mary's stadium. 

One was a shot from Georginio Wijnaldum which struck an arm, with the second when Mane went down under challenge from Kyle Walker-Peters.

“The best situations were when Sadio had the ball,” Klopp told Sky Sports. “Anyone who ever again says Sadio Mane is a diver is the biggest joke in the world. This boy tries to stay on his feet. There were two situations where other teams will get a penalty for it.

“The handball, I do now know who will explain that to me.

"If this boy went down easy, we could have had a penalty in this game and a stonewall penalty in the last game [against Newcastle]. But what Andre Marriner did with Sadio Mane tonight, I’m not sure that’s OK, to be honest. 

“He tried absolutely everything, a few great challenges with [James] Ward-Prowse, but there were a lot of situations which were free-kicks as well. The last situation where he goes down in the box, if you see that, he [Walker-Peters] hits him again with his left foot. It’s another penalty. 

“I hear now that Man United had more penalties in two years than I had in five-and-a-half years. I’ve no idea if that’s my fault, or how that can happen.

“This does not make our performance better, it should not take anything away from Southampton, but in these situations we were very unfortunate at least.”