Watching Liverpool triumph, you have to ask: is there any way you can be persuaded to stay Jurgen?
THIS is not the first time the question has been asked of Jurgen Klopp and it will not be the last. But in the aftermath of Liverpool’s emotionally charged victory over Chelsea in the Carabao Cup final on Sunday, it feels particularly pertinent. Is there really no way that you can be persuaded to stay?
Is there really nothing that will change your mind? Is there nothing that could make you reconsider the decision to leave Anfield at the end of this season after nine years in charge? Is there nothing that could make you think that maybe, in the modern Liverpool you have built, the best is yet to come?
Because there was something about the triumph over Chelsea and the manner in which it was achieved, with an intoxicating blend of magisterial experience and optimistic youth, that made it feel as if it might be a transformative experience for all of those involved on the winning side.
It felt as if this was not an era that was coming to an end. It felt as if this was an era that was just beginning. Klopp built one great side at Liverpool and it is beginning to look as if he has built another. It is only in its first flowering but it has the feel of a group of players who might go on to achieve special things.
It is a shame to think Klopp will not be around to enjoy the fruits of all the work he has put in and all the pressure he has endured. It is a pity to think he might not be around in future years to oversee the maturing of this collection of players he has brought together. If there was anything in Sunday’s victory that felt bittersweet, it was that.
Jamie Carragher, the former Liverpool and England defender, drew an interesting comparison yesterday between Klopp and Bill Shankly, who was the Liverpool manager between 1959 and 1974 and resigned suddenly when many felt he, and his team, were at the height of their powers.
Carragher pointed out that Shankly was the father of the modern Liverpool and that even though Bob Paisley, who succeeded him as manager, was in charge when Liverpool won the first three of their European Cups, Liverpool fans always acknowledged that ‘every trophy lifted between 1974-1990 had Shankly’s reflection in the silverware’.
And it will be the same with Klopp (below) and whoever comes next. Because, if he really cannot be persuaded to stay, he is leaving the club in such good shape that they look set to maintain their place at, or near, the top of the English game for years to come. The next generation is already in place and raring to go.
Klopp, of course, has already anticipated attempts to get him to renege on his decision. He was honest about his motives for leaving. He said he could sense his energy dwindling and that his modus operandi meant that he could not operate at anything less than full throttle.
‘I can’t do it on three wheels,’ he said when he announced his intention to leave at the end of last month. ‘I don’t want to be a passenger. My manager skills are based on energy and relationships. I am who I am and where I am because of how I am. I cannot be that any more. My energy level was endless but now it’s not. Now we have to change.’ There is no reason at all to think that Klopp’s intention has changed. Football management is a punishing, exacting, highpressure job that takes a toll on all who do it. Klopp knows himself. He knows his family. He knows what is best for him and for them. But sometimes, intentions change. Circumstances change. To extend Carragher’s reference to Shankly, Shankly regretted his decision to resign and, for a while, haunted the old Liverpool training ground at Melwood until the club had to ask him to stay away because it was affecting Paisley’s ability to stamp his authority on the team. And the reality is that, until Liverpool name a successor to Klopp, there will be hope against hope that he can be perLiverpool suaded to change his mind. Alex Ferguson did it once at Manchester United, don’t forget and went on to win a second Champions League trophy.
And if Bayer Leverkusen coach and former Liverpool favourite Xabi Alonso decides to go to Bayern Munich next season rather than return to Merseyside, those hopes will be brought into sharper focus.
Part of every Liverpool fan will wonder if there’s a chance. They will wonder if an experience like Sunday’s — a victory Klopp described as ‘easily the most special trophy’ of his Liverpool career — could be capable of having a rejuvenating effect on the manager who has given so much to their club already.
It was clear, certainly, that he was moved by the maturity and the excellence of the performances of academy products James McConnell, 19, Jayden Danns, 18, Bobby Clark, 19, Jarell Quansah, 21, and Conor Bradley, 20, who all played important roles in the triumph.
‘The development of Bobby Clark, It’s really crazy, I have to say,’ Klopp said after the final whistle at Wembley. ‘The development of James McConnell is absolutely insane. And Dannsy, I love him, from his first training session.’
If this was the beginning of the end, then it is going to be one hell of a final farewell for Klopp as he leads Liverpool in their pursuit of four trophies.
When Shankly quit, when Kenny Dalglish resigned as manager, the supporters never really got to say a proper goodbye and the emotions that will be unleashed as Klopp’s departure grows nearer will fuel the club’s tilt at all their glories.
He has made the decision to go but if managing at Anfield makes demands on a person that few of us can properly understand, the leaving of Liverpool will be the hardest deal that Klopp has ever closed.