Karius takes blame after nightmare night in Kiev

Liverpool goalkeeper Loris Karius accepted the blame for his team’s 3-1 defeat to Real Madrid in the Champions League final in which he made two dreadful errors that both led to goals.

The German gifted Real their opening goal in the 51st minute when, hurrying to start an attack, he threw the ball out in front of Real striker Karim Benzema, who stuck his leg out and turned the ball into the net.

Karius, 24, was also at fault for Real’s third goal when Gareth Bale tried a speculative long-range effort which flew in through the flapping arms of the Liverpool keeper.

“I don’t feel anything right now. Today I lost my team the game and I feel sorry for everyone,” Karius said.

“I’m sorry for everyone - from the team, from the whole club - that the mistakes cost dearly. If I could go back in time, I would. I feel sorry for my team. I know I let them down today.

“These goals cost us the title, basically,” he added.

“It’s very hard right now but that’s the life of a goalkeeper. You have to get your head up again.”

Karius lay face down on the field at the end of the game before he was consoled by his opponents. He said his team mates had tried to raise his spirits in the dressing room.

“Of course everyone tried to cheer me up - but there was just silence everywhere because everyone was really disappointed,” he said.

While acknowledging the mistakes, Klopp said he had great sympathy for the keeper he signed from his former club Mainz.

“What can I say? Loris knows it, everybody knows it. It’s a shame in a game like this and after a season like this. I really feel for him; he’s a fantastic boy,” Klopp said.

“Nobody wants that, (but) that’s the situation. The mistakes were obvious, we don’t have to talk about that, it’s all clear; he knows it, I know it, you all know it.

“Now, he has to deal with it, we have to deal with, we will do that – of course we will be with him, there’s no doubt about that. It was not his night, obviously,” he added.

Former Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard, a Champions League winner with the club in 2005, told BT Sport that Karius had lost his cool for the first goal.

“We spoke about experience before the game, know-how on the big stage and the Madrid players being more switched on. The first goal is a keeper in a rush,” he said.

“It’s a rush of blood to the head, all he had to do was stay calm and he’s made a mistake and been punished.”