Klopp: Spending mega bucks is no guarantee of stealing our crown

JURGEN KLOPP has warned Chelsea that it will take more than a £200 million ($A358 million) spending spree to wrench the title from Liverpool’s grasp.

Before the start of the new Premier League season on Saturday, Klopp also said that clubs “owned by countries, owned by oligarchs” were less susceptible to the financial repercussions of the pandemic and insisted Liverpool were a “different kind of club”.

He added that there was more to building a team than simply entering the transfer market for new signings.

Liverpool begin the quest to be crowned back-to-back league champions against Leeds United on Saturday evening, having so far added only the Greece left back Kostas Tsimikas, to their squad — an outlay in sharp contrast to the transfer kitty that Frank Lampard, the Chelsea manager, has spent on players such as Timo Werner, Kai Havertz and Ben Chilwell.

Klopp said: “We live in a world at the moment with a lot of uncertainty. For some clubs it seems less important how uncertain the future is: [those] owned by countries, owned by oligarchs, that’s the truth. We’re a different kind of club.

“We got to the Champions League final two years ago, we won it last year, and became Premier League champions last season by being the club we are, by leading the way we are led.

“We cannot just change it overnight and say, ‘So now we want to behave like Chelsea’. Now they are signing a lot of players. That can be an advantage, of course, but that means they have to fit together pretty quickly as well.

“You cannot bring in the 11 best players and hope a week later they play the best football ever. It’s about working together on the training ground.”