Klopp’s motley crew of players fits right in to his tactical nous
’DO you know how difficult it is to play like that? Seriously. Do people realise?”
These were the words of a Liverpool legend ahead of Anfield’s latest thrill-seekers’ convention against Roma.
“To get your players to show such bravery against the best teams in Europe?” he continued. “To get into their heads they can go anywhere and keep going forward?
“Guardiola is doing it and he is regarded as a genius but Klopp is the same. If it was so easy to do what Liverpool are doing tactically, why isn’t everyone else doing it?”
There was justifiable incredulity that amid all the rightful acclaim for Jurgen Klopp’s work – and a season in which Mohamed Salah is now being tipped by teammates to add the Ballon d’Or to his Professional Footballers’ Association Player of the Year – it is still often misunderstood.
While Pep Guardiola and Jose Mourinho are portrayed as strategists, Klopp’s attacking aggression is somehow regarded as less sophisticated, built around emotion rather than control.
The German coach is perceived in some quarters as a manic cheerleader, confounding logic by ordering players to surge forward frenziedly in a zigzag formation.
How comforting for future generations of Liverpool managers to know such a basic blueprint has been designed.
Turn up, order the Kop to sing louder, treat the players like friends and deliver funny oneliners in press conferences. Why has no one else since Bill Shankly thought of that? Klopp is partially responsible for this sluggish misreading, of course.
It was he who coined the phrase “heavy-metal football”, thus perpetuating the image his gang of metalheads are smashing up the philharmonic. If Klopp was passionate about classical music, there may have been more inclination to depict him as a conductor. Equally, he might argue there is as much artistic merit in the opening riff of AC/DC’s Back in Black as Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata.
Liverpool’s success to date is an amalgamation of finely-tuned choreography on the training pitch stirring the masses on matchday.
Training drills are a repeat prescription. It demands highly technical and tactical attacking football to move the ball at speed from Loris Karius to Salah to tear through opponents, and the harrying of the opponents from Roberto Firmino back to Karius to ensure Liverpool are more difficult to create chances against than their set-piece frailties and inexplicable late lapses in concentration suggest.
Porto, City and – after one leg of the semifinal – Roma barely had a shot on target against Klopp’s side. There is more studiousness and theory to the work of Klopp and his backroom team – and, indeed, those recruiting on their behalf – than has been credited. It is comparable to Guardiola in that both managers see more risk and zero pleasure in cautious football.
What separates the greatest from the waves of imitators is the methodology, courage of their convictions, access to the personnel capable of executing their plan and, yes, charismatic leadership. The most evocative symphony or guitar solo ever written is nothing more than an instruction on a sheet of paper without the talent to perform it. But anyone who believes there are not as many emerging coaches seeking to copy Klopp as much as Guardiola is delusional.
Many will presume they are never going to manage a club with Lionel Messi or backed by an Arab state, so will find the Liverpool manager a more realistic character study.
Football historians will be fascinated in what Klopp, his coaches and his scouts saw in Salah that Mourinho did not.
Mourinho may even want to ask himself, as Dejan Lovren predicted more personal accolades for the Egyptian.
“Forty-three goals!” said Lovren, summing up the disbelief as much as admiration at Salah’s achievement.
“I don’t know if this is the right time to put pressure on him but I believe he should be regarded as one of the best three in the world at the end of the year. He deserves it how he is doing right now.
“He deserves to be mentioned for the Ballon d’Or – when people talk about Messi and Ronaldo, they should also talk about Salah. He deserves the credit, but I think he deserves even more, to be honest. He is becoming the superstar. It looks easy what he does but it is very difficult. We help him, the manager helps and this style of play helps him a lot. He didn’t play that style before at Basel, Chelsea and Roma.
“They had different styles and this style suits him perfectly. Hopefully, he will stay injuryfree.”
Klopp, his backroom team and recruitment staff deserve eulogies for facilitating such rapid progression. There is more to it than hugs and persuasion.
After a prolonged era where tedious pragmatism has dominated tactical approaches domestically, in European competition and, especially, in international football, we must hope Klopp, like Guardiola, inspires an enlightened age of progressive, entertaining and, most thrillingly of all, daring football. —