It is his birthday on Saturday. Seven years ago, Jurgen Klopp took charge of Liverpool. Of their post-war managers only Bill Shankly and Bob Paisley have lasted longer.
It should be a time for celebration but Liverpool’s start is the worst under his management and, 11 points off the pace with Arsenal and Manchester City next up, the party could be over before the sound of the first popped cork.
Klopp quit Borussia Dortmund after seven years following a season, which, like this one, began with a victory over a team managed by Pep Guardiola in the German equivalent of the Community Shield.
Then, he was exhausted by trying to keep up with the resources of Guardiola’s Bayern Munich and a feeling that his intense form of “heavy metal football” or Gegenpressing had been worked out by too many sides in the Bundesliga.
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“Teams have worked out how they can play against us when we are not at our best,” Klopp reflected. “Other teams have worked out how to play against us for years but it didn’t work out for them because we were exceptional. It is important that we become unpredictable again.”
On Monday on the training pitches at Kirkby, Klopp instigated a change of formation; a 4-4-2 with Jordan Henderson and Thiago Alcantara shielding the defence and Trent Alexander-Arnold told to stay deeper rather than open up the space behind him that so many teams have exploited.
Rangers, yet to score a goal in the Champions League, were comfortably beaten. Subduing Gabriel Jesus and then Erling Haaland will be in a different order of difficulty. Trudging up Snowdon is no indication of how you will handle the north wall of the Eiger.
Klopp knows it. “When you have a problem and spot a solution, you want the solution to click in instantly; that is human nature. I am not interested in this short-term diagnosis – ‘this was good, that was bad’. We have to be good until we are outstanding. We have Arsenal, Rangers and then Manchester City. Then we are through the tunnel and can see the light.”
He wanted to say that he expected Liverpool to start “defending the s__t” out of games but politely changed the word to “rubbish”. You knew what he meant. Liverpool have conceded the first goal in seven of their last nine league games.
There are problems across Liverpool’s back line, some of them temporary. When Ron Atkinson was manager of Manchester United, he thought the key to stopping Liverpool was being able to block off Phil Neal. A ball that started at the feet of the right back would all too often end up at the tip of Ian Rush’s boot.
You could say the same about Andy Robertson and Sadio Mane. Their partnership on the left flank was one of the many electrifying patterns of Klopp’s Liverpool. Mane is at Bayern Munich and Robertson is still troubled by a knee injury.
Virgil van Dijk, who stands in the Anfield pantheon alongside Yeats, Thompson and Hansen, has been left exposed and that sense of absolute command he wielded seems to have disappeared. Liverpool’s first-half defending against Brighton stood comparisons with Manchester United’s capitulation at Brentford.
Van Dijk was at pains to point out that it was not a hangover from the disappointments of last season. It was, he said, a lack of confidence.
Disappointment is relative. Had Newcastle won the League and FA Cups, the Geordie nation would have lined the Scotswood Road all the way to St James’ Park.
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The last time Liverpool began this badly was in 2014, when the pain of the longed-for title that disappeared with Steven Gerrard’s slip still lingered. Liverpool had lost a great striker in Luis Suarez and replaced him with someone of more uncertain gifts, Mario Balotelli.
For Suarez read Mane, for Balotelli read Nunez, who has not completed 90 minutes at Anfield since his stunning display for Benfica in the Champions League quarter-final in April. Klopp’s predecessor, Brendan Rodgers, confessed to Gerrard that Balotelli was “a gamble, a big gamble” and so in his way is Nunez.
He is 23, from rural Uruguay, and is living with his wife and baby boy in a country whose language he does not speak.
He has only once scored more than 20 goals in a season, carries a price tag heavier than Haaland’s and was sent off on his home debut. There were some lovely touches against Rangers but it would be remarkable if Nunez did not find some of this overwhelming.
Football is now seen almost entirely through the prism of statistics. Liverpool’s website summed up Nunez by announcing he creates an encouraging 7.4 chances per 90 minutes. This was to ignore the human factor. There are men beneath these shirts and sometimes their flesh is exposed. Happy birthday, Jurgen.
from Football | News and analysis from the Premier League and beyond | iNews https://inews.co.uk/sport/football/liverpool-mane-exit-robertson-injury-van-dijk-1900109
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