Football Jurgen Klopp might not understand autographs ... ... but Ido
Opinion: Fans ask for signatures to let stars know they are special - the shirt Klopp signed for Alyson Rudd’s dad reduced her to tears.
Jurgen Klopp said last week that he remains baffled whenever people ask for his autograph. Let me explain why they do. Just before the pandemic shut down football my father turned 80 and on his birthday weekend, Liverpool were at home to Southampton. Somehow, through sheer decency, the club made him feel like the most important supporter at the game. They could not know it, but he probably was.
Before kick-off I had walked with my dad around Anfield and he pointed out where he went to school, where he played football and the very spot where the sadistic games teacher would make the boys turn around and go back to lessons before a ball had been kicked because of a minor transgression such as a giggle or a whisper. There could not have been a single person inside the ground that day who had lived a life as close to it.
Once inside, they gave John, my father, a gift bag, which I assumed would contain a match programme and a scarf or maybe a bottle of LFC-branded booze. But then my dad pulled out a replica shirt with his name and the No 80 on the back where Klopp had written “To Dr John Rudd” and signed it with added initials, just in case we didn’t recognise the signature.
After a tough childhood my dad had learnt to contain his emotions and he took the gift in his stride, leaving me to burst into tears at the sheer thoughtfulness of it.
It was the last truly enjoyable day I was to spend with my father. He had started to disappear into his own version of anxiety and dementia and the whole family were tense on the morning of the trip to Anfield in case match day coincided with one in which he would not leave his room.
We were blessed with fine weather and Dad in such fine spirits that when they walked Bruce Grobbelaar, the former goalkeeper, over to meet him he recognised him and chatted to him as if he met Liverpool legends on a daily basis.
The remarkable and brilliant Dr John Rudd, the man who took a day off work to drive me into Formby so I could sit and stare at the sports shop my hero Stevie Heighway had just opened, died last year.
I treasure the memory of the game against Southampton and I have the signed shirt as a tangible reminder of it. So far I have managed to step away from the jersey when in danger of staining it with tears.
I once bonded with Michael Johnson, the former sprinter, in the green room before a Times+ event after he was asked to sign a few copies of his book. He had been quiet but when I told him I found the concept of the autograph a little odd, he became animated and we chatted about how neither of us had ever wanted a famous person to sign anything.
I still don’t, but my dad’s shirt means so much more because if Klopp had met my dad he would have admired him and the feeling would have been mutual.
My father valued decency and he would have been far more likely to congratulate the German on his demeanour than his trophies. I suspect they would have found common ground on practically any topic, be it Brexit or vaccinations, you care to mention.
Being manager of Liverpool is like being the leader of a small nation. Red Scousers expect someone who can represent them properly to be in charge and so although he is not even British, there is something very familiar about his self-deprecating humour and left-of-centre politics that resonates with the supporters. But how exhausting must that be, to have to manage an elite football club while being a head of state. It is not the least surprising, really, that he needs, after 8 and a half years, a break from the sheer intensity.
People want Klopp’s autograph as a way of letting him know he is special, that he is beloved. It is a way to spend an extra two seconds in the company of a hero. It is something to gaze upon, allowing it to trigger thoughts of glory but also how it has never been just about the winning. It has been about the style, the panache, the personality, the leadership.
And when the cameras pan to fans in tears after Klopp's last game in charge, against Wolverhampton Wanderers next Monday, it will have very little to do with winning the title or Champions League glory or the FA Cup triumph and much more to do with the manner in which he won them.