Jurgen Klopp admits Christian Benteke is better suited to Crystal Palace than Liverpool

Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp is not surprised by Christian Benteke's stellar start at Crystal Palace. The 25-year-old Belgian left Anfield for £27m ($32.7m), plus add-ons, during the summer transfer window and has hit the ground running with his new club.

Benteke has found the net three times for Palace and although he did not feature in Klopp's plans at Anfield, the Liverpool boss thinks the striker's quality is unmistakable. He said that Palace is the ideal place for Benteke to prove his worth.

"It's no surprise. We knew about his qualities. Every player needs the space to develop and show things," the Liverpool manager reflected, according to The Mirror. "The move made sense. Palace bought the player. In the last year he always showed his qualities, especially good at heading.

"We had to make decisions. I'm always honest. My door is always open."

Liverpool head into the weekend joint-top of the Premier League, alongside Arsenal and Manchester City – and the German has observed a feel-good factor around the club in recent weeks. "One reason for football is we can win together, we can lose sometimes together, but you can always have an optimistic view," Klopp said.

"Maybe we had to change the minds of fans about the past, but while I don't know too much about enthusiasm I feel there is a positive atmosphere in and around Melwood at the moment."

Klopp said creating a positive atmosphere around the club was crucial to Liverpool realising their long-term ambitions. "It's not cool when you always think about football that you're 20% more upset, you should be feeling better. That's our job to do," he said. "Until now it's worked somehow. It's really, really intense even when football isn't the most important thing."