Jurgen’s team have a chance to surpass a legendary Liverpool unbeaten record tomorrow as they go for... KLOPP
BY DAVID MADDOCK
JURGEN KLOPP’S high-flying team have the chance to rewrite history this weekend.
By avoiding defeat at West Ham tomorrow, Liverpool will have gone 26 games unbeaten in all competitions, a Kop club record.
They would surpass the 25-game unbeaten record of the legendary early 1980s side, widely regarded as the best in Liverpool’s history.
And while manager Klopp says he can make no comparisons, he says his team has the same hunger for trophies as Bob Paisley’s greats.
“No, we don’t compare ourselves with them (Paisley’s team),” the German said. We try to do what is possible now. And I don’t know what is possible. We don’t look at what’s possible and then decide ‘oh it could be difficult’ and stop.
“No. If we see it is possible but difficult, then the fun part starts. Then we want to go for it with all we have.”
Klopp is steeped in Liverpool history and he knows Paisley’s 80s team is one of the greatest of all time, so to beat their record would be some achievement. In nine seasons as manager, Paisley, who succeeded Bill Shankly in 1974, won six League titles, three European Cups, three League Cups and one UEFA Cup.
The Liverpool team that won the European Cup in 1981, beating Real
Madrid in the final in Paris, contained names like Kenny Dalglish, Graeme Souness, Alan Hansen, Ray Clemence and Terry McDermott.
With moneybags teams like Manchester City and Chelsea in direct competition, it is incredibly hard these days to win the volume of trophies that make players legends. Klopp insists that is what singles out the 80s side as alltime greats... and is also the drive behind his own team’s ambitions.
“It was not easy in the Shankly and Paisley times to win football games. There was a specific level for all footballers and all teams and one team had to overcome it,” he said.
“To do that as regularly as Bob’s teams did, that makes them all-time greats. No doubt about that.
But why should we compare? I think this team has set a few records which nobody reached in the 100-odd years of the club’s history already.
“We are not really focused on records, but if it happens then it is obviously a good sign because it means we are winning football games, and that is what we are interested in.
“But we don’t go for a record at West Ham, we go for three points. That is difficult enough.”
Liverpool’s unbeaten run began on April 10 with a 2-1 defeat of Aston Villa at Anfield. Their last defeat came four days earlier, 3-1 at Real Madrid in the Champions League. Before that Madrid tie, Liverpool had lost six of their previous 11 matches in all competitions.