Jurgen Klopp’s last dance, the end of rock and roll football
At the beginning of 2 02 4, Ju rgen Kloppshocked the world when he annou nced that this wou ld be his final season at the helm of Liverndou pool. Reds fans are u btedly sad abou t the impending departu re of their most su ccessfu l manager of the 2 1st centu ry , bu t those concerns were momentarily pau sed on Su nday as the German claimed his eighth piece of silverware since his Anfield ap015. pointment in 2 The celebrations were lou d and long, not only becau se of the circu mstances su rrou nding the game, bu t becau se su pporters know they have only fou r months left with this special coach. Soccer Ladu ma international writer Kamogelo Motecwane decided to look back on what has been a su ccessfu l tenu re for the Stu ttgart native.
Before Klopp
When England’s top division w as renamed the Premier League from the Football League First Division, Liverpool w ere the most successful side in the country by some w ay. The Merseysiders had 18 league titles to their name, w ith the nex t best side, Arsenal, only having 10. Heading into the Premier League era, they w ere ex pected to carry on being the nation’s serial w inners, but unfortunately for them that w as not the case. They had to bear w itness to bitter rivals Manchester United, under the tutelage of Sir Alex Ferguson, usurping them as the club w ith the most league championships, w ith 20, by the time of the Scotsman’s retirement in 2013. During the tw o decades the EPL had ex isted up until that point, the Reds had gone from being perennial title contenders to being, at best, bridesmaids of the competition. Before Jurgen Klopp’s arrival at the famed football institution, Liverpool finished second in the Premier League three times. The first w as under French tactician Gerard Houllier during the 2001/02 campaign, w hen they w ere able to w in the FA Community Shield, UEFA Cup (now UEFA Europa League) and FA Cup, but w ere beaten to the title by Arsenal. The second time w as w ith Rafael Benitez in 2008/09. The Spaniard looked to supplement his 2004/05 UEFA Champions League triumph w ith a long-aw aited league championship, and after sitting atop of the log standings for most of 2008, they relinquished top spot to the Red Devils in January and the Mancunians never looked back.
The third time w as perhaps the most agonising as, in 2013/14, Liverpool w ere a Steven Gerrard slip aw ay from ending a 24-year w ait for a league title. With three games left to w in before being crow ned kings of England, one of the club’s most iconic players slipped against Chelsea as Demba Ba pounced to score and earn the Blues a pivotal 1-0 victory. Their nex t game against Crystal Palace w as, how ever, the nail in the coffin as it ended 3-3, effectively ending their title aspirations. That happened under Brendan Rodgers, and w ith Luis Suarez sold at the beginning of the follow ing campaign, the club w ould essentially revert to being a Europa League side. After an underw helming start to the 2015/16 season, coupled w ith frustrations from the previous campaign, Fenw ay Sports Group decided they had seen enough from Rodgers and fired the northern Irishman. It w as time to find a manager w ho not only had the tactical know -how to finally w in the club its first-ever Premier League title, but also the charisma to connect w ith the fans and reinvigorate the famous atmosphere that Anfield had become w orld-renow ned for. Names like Carlo Ancelotti and Roberto Di Matteo w ere touted for the role, but the American ow nership decided that Jurgen Klopp w as the man for the job.
Rock and roll football
Acquiring former Borussia Dortmund tactician’s services proved a major coup for FSG, because the tw o-time Bundesliga w inner w as still taking a sabbatical from football. Klopp had managed to successfully loosen Bayern Munich’s stranglehold on German top-flight football w hen he took Die Schw arzgelben from a struggling midtable side to back-toback title w inners in 2011 and 2012, before taking them to the 2012/13 UEFA Champions League final too. Now he had to aw aken another sleeping giant of European football in Liverpool, and w hile his first season in the league did not go according to plan, finishing eighth, the club’s upw ard trajectory w as evident by his second campaign in charge. Working alongside Michael Edw ards, the team w as able to recruit savvily, and together they w ere able to assemble w hat w ould go on to be categorized among the best on the continent.
Success, how ever, w as not immediate at Anfield. What he dubbed as “rock and roll football” in his first press conference at the club w as not yielding any tangible success as far as silverw are w as concerned. His high-pressing, high-intensity football got him to tw o finals in his debut campaign on Merseyside, the Carabao Cup and Europa League finals, both of w hich Liverpool lost, and by the time 2018 came around, Real Madrid had inflicted yet another cup loss on them, this time in the Champions League. This w ould have angered most fanbases of clubs as big as Liverpool, but they w ere patient and understood w here they had come from. Klopp managed to turn a team that w as struggling to qualify for Europe’s premier club competition to one that got to its final in the space of three years. He had ex pedited the club’s transition in a tremendous w ay and the longer he stayed, the more it felt as though it w as inevitable he w ould finally w in a trophy for the Reds. His time at Melw ood w ould begin its peak in the 2018/19 campaign, by w hich time he had assembled one of the greatest-ever Premier League sides to ever grace a top-division pitch.
His fearsome front three of Sadio Mane, Roberto Firmino and Mohamed Salah w ere being fed goals from tw o of the league’s most effective, ever-offensive fullbacks in Andrew Robertson and Trent Alex anderArnold. The African duo w ere the main beneficiaries of the marauding fullbacks as they w ere often on the end of their deliveries, w ith both CAF Men’s Player of the Year w inners ending that campaign, along w ith Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, w ith the EPL’s Golden Boot. Robertson and Alex ander-Arnold w ere able to do this because of the industry of the midfield duo Jordan Henderson and Georginio Wijnaldum, w hile Fabinho served as the lynchpin. The Brazilian formed part of a spine that included Joel Matip and Virgil van Dijk, w ho w ould be nominated for a Ballon d’Or at the end of that season, w ith Allison Becker betw een the sticks. These eleven players achieved the thirdhighest points tally in EPL history at the time, 97, but w ere unfortunately still unable to w in the league as City pipped them to the championship by a single point. Klopp did, how ever, manage to get his hands on his first trophy w ith the club, a cup Liverpool have a strong affinity for, the Champions League. Having lost his first UCL final in the city of London, he w as able to beat a club from the English capital, Tottenham Hotspur, in 2019 to finally get his hands on the big-eared trophy at the third time of asking.
By the time the 2019/20 season kicked off, it w as clear w hat the mandate for Klopp’s charges w as, to w in the English top-flight title. Having come so close the season before, it w as evident that everybody involved on Merseyside knew there w ould be no room for error this time around as a 1-1 draw w ith Manchester United w as their only dropped points during their first 26 games of the EPL season. By the time Liverpool lost their first game of the season to Watford in Matchw eek 28, they w ere already 19 points ahead of the reigning champions, so it became a matter w hen and not if the German w ould finally get his hands on the Premier League trophy. That apparent inevitability w ould be halted, how ever, w hen the league, and sports across the w orld, stopped due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The EPL resumed in June, though, and having reached unprecedented levels prior to the pause in proceedings, the Reds didn’t quite look the same after that as they only w on six of their remaining 10 matches. It didn’t matter because, follow ing City’s defeat to Chelsea on 25 June, they w ere crow ned the earliest league title w inners in English top-flight history. He finally emulated w hat icons such as Bob Paisley, Bill Shankly and, more recently, Sir Kenny Dalglish, w ere able to do, and that is hold the league title aloft.
The last dance – one trophy collected, three to go?
Since that league-w inning campaign, it’s been hard replicating the feat, but he came close once again in the 2021/22 season. An Aston Villa collapse on the final day handed Pep Guardiola his fourth EPL title as Klopp missed out on the league by a single point once again to the Spaniard and his Citizens. He suffered heartbreak continentally as w ell, w hen Real Madrid beat Liverpool 1-0 in that season’s UEFA Champions League final. Having w on the Carabao Cup and FA Cup that season, the Reds almost completed a historic quadruple, but it w as not to be. This season, he has another chance at undertaking this monumental task, and this past w eekend, he w on the first piece of silverw are available this campaign, beating Chelsea in the League Cup final thanks to a Virgil van Dijk goal in the 118th minute. Liverpool are currently top of the league table, are in the round of the 16 of the Europa League, and are also still in the FA Cup. The victory over the Blues takes the 56-year-old’s trophy haul since arriving at the club to 10, and w hile, in the future many, w ill likely look at it and think he could have perhaps achieved more for a manager that is held in such high regard, contex t is important. Klopp rebuilt w hat w as slow ly regressing into a mid-table side and turned them into w orld-beaters, but unfortunately came up against some formidable Los Blancos and Citizen teams during his reign. In 2023/24, the former defender has the chance to bow out on an even greater high as, despite being plagued by injuries to many of his starters, the team has still managed to compete at an ex tremely high level. It speaks to the culture he has cultivated over the past eight and a half years he has been at the club, and w hether or not he w ins another trophy at Liverpool, he w ill undoubtedly be remembered as one of their all-time great managers by their supporters.