DON’T GET MAD ...GET EVEN
How Klopp helped Reds through one of the toughest, craziest nights to BELIEVE they could avenge the injustices of 2018
JURGEN KLOPP passionately believes he and Liverpool had to come through “one of the worst nights of our lives” to be where they are today.
A historic quadruple bid stalled only on the final day of the Premier League season, with the Reds within minutes of a remarkable triumph.
But there is still the “consolation” of tonight’s Champions League final and a score to settle with Real Madrid.
Klopp chuckles now, as he recalls the mayhem of the night – and next morning – after defeat by the Spanish giants in the 2018 final (above).
And the moment he realised it was the start of something incredible, not the end.
“It started as one of the worst nights in my life. I remember actually only a little glimpse of light while standing in the queue at the airport,” said Klopp, on the eve of yet another final for his team.
“We had to go through a security check, going to the plane, and I had this thought, ‘Do we come back next year?’ But I actually remembered it only a year later.
“I didn’t think about it all throughout the whole Champions League campaign in 2019. Just when we qualified for the final, I remembered there was something and I remembered that was there.”
It was the aftermath of that defeat, though, which set the foundation for what has come since from Klopp and his incredible Liverpool team, with all six major honours available to an English side collected since that night.
He recalled: “The flight was obviously horrendous. The feeling was down. The families were in another plane, and the worst moment was still to come – facing family and friends. That’s exactly how it was.
“When we arrived at Melwood on our bus, all the wives, girlfriends, friends, everybody was crying. Unbelievable. We were not crying. I cry quite frequently in similar situations, but not that day as I was OK, kind of.
“It was a football game, there were strange circumstances, but everybody was crying. My agent was crying! I was going, ‘Eh, what’s going on?’”
It was after that emotional return to Liverpool, as night turned to day in the city, that Klopp and a few friends – including the famous German singer Campino – had the party to end all parties.
They came up with a famous song that said they would be back. Klopp said: “It was now morning, pretty much, and then we went to the house and let a few people in. You know it’s the former house of Stevie Gerrard, so a little bit of the furniture was still in there.
“There was a big vase in the guest toilet, and Peter Krawietz goes into the toilet and comes out (Klopp then motions to lift a big vase, like a trophy, above his head) and goes, ‘Yes! It looks like the Champions League trophy a little bit!’.
“Everybody took it and had pictures with it here and there, ‘Ah, that’s how it feels’.”
Campino, real name Andreas Frege and the lead singer of Die Toten Hosen, took it even further, as Klopp laughingly
remembered. He said: “Campino, a good friend and massive LFC supporter, starts the song.
“The fun part about it – we were all drunk – was it was a bit rainy, then we sang it, and recorded it on a smartphone. Then somebody said, ‘The world needs that as well!’. Campino called his agency at home and said, ‘Put it out on Twitter!’
“They said, ‘Wait, wait, wait, let me speak to Jurgen, if he really wants that?’ And he was lying outside in socks, in the rain, on the grass... ‘Jurgen, Jurgen! Do you really want to do it?’ ‘Yeah, of course!’. But it was good, OK.
“It pictured the mood we were in. It was already then… we were over it. The new season had started already and it started with that.”
The song suggested ‘We’ll just keep on being cool, and bring it back to Liverpool’, meaning the Champions League, and Klopp delivered a year later as they beat Tottenham in the final in Madrid.
“Our Champions League story so far is a pretty special one,” he added. “And it’s to be continued...”