After Liverpool ended the first part of their season with a 3-1 win over Southampton, Jürgen Klopp explained how he was "really relieved" to go into the rest of the World Cup.
After Roberto Firmino's early goal, Darwin Nunez's goal scored all three points for the Reds at Anfield on Saturday.
Despite their recent improvement in form, the German said he was "really relieved" that he had entered the break of the World Cup, claiming that he was "hungry" to score six points in the last two league games against Tottenham and Southampton.
"Now it's over and I'm really relieved," Klopp told Sky Sports full-time.
'Two weeks ago, when I knew those two games were still there, I really wanted to get those six points, we put in a huge effort for that and the boys deserve it.
'The Champions League is obviously good, it's a tough start, but then it's convincing, it's good, it's good to stay in the Carabao Cup.
"So there are good aspects, but we know we have room for improvement and we will change appropriately to close that gap."
A number of injury issues have hampered the Reds' season so far and Klopp hopes his players will have more luck when his team regroup after the World Cup.
Those who don't go to Qatar will attend a mid-season training camp in Dubai, which Klopp calls another "pre-season".
"Our problem is that throughout the first part of the season we had to play against the same players a lot and you can't rest here," explained the boss.
"We are happy now that everyone is injury-free today because the World Cup is especially important for these players."
"We know we can do better, we have to do better, we will do better. We had three weeks with a big group of people and it was a proper pre-season to start with a lot of games, but it didn't matter. ”
"Hopefully we can stay healthy. We've had a lot of injuries and maybe we can be more fortunate to get injured for the rest of the season and that will help. If not, we have to fight our boys to the end. ”