Klopp gears Van up for hate mob
JURGEN KLOPP intends to talk to Virgil van Dijk to ensure the player’s focus remains sharp before the former Southampton player runs the gauntlet of hate at St Mary’s tomorrow.
Liverpool manager Klopp admitted he was not in the habit of speaking with players on their return to former clubs.
But Klopp believes there was enough bad feeling over the protracted transfer of Van Dijk to Anfield, a move which dragged from last summer to the January transfer window, to guarantee a hostile reception.
“It is obviously quite special and yes, for sure, I will talk to Virgil about it. With other players I didn’t talk about it but for him yes, of course,” said Klopp.
“It will not be a normal game for him, how can it be? It was a special story, most of the time really positive and then the end not that positive.
“And I think how football fans are, they want to disturb everything we try to do to help their team and they will whistle.
“Is it nice? I don’t think so. Will it have influence? I don’t think so. But we are all human beings, we are influenced by circumstances.
“We have to accept it how it is: loud, not nice maybe, but still we have to play football.”
Van Dijk angered Southampton fans last summer when submitting a transfer request in August as several big clubs, including Liverpool, Chelsea and Manchester City, circled.
Relations between player and club soured further when he was perceived to have downed tools as the Saints held out for more cash.
The club then fined him two weeks’ wages REPORTS for refusing to train – an allegation that Van Dijk vehemently denied.
Klopp joked yesterday that Southampton fans may now be “really happy” with the record £75million fee that was sent to the south coast.
But given Van Dijk is just one of several players to take the well-worn path from St Mary’s to Anfield, vitriol from the stands is inevitable.
He followed Adam Lallana (£25m), Nathaniel Clyne (£12.5m), Dejan Lovren (£20m) and Sadio Mane (£34m) in being cherry-picked from the Saints to go to Anfield in the past three years. But St Mary’s manager Mauricio Pellegrino has a message for those making plans for tomorrow: Be thankful, not hateful. “We have to be grateful with him,” he said. “Virgil is part of the past. He did well in our club and he left some profit to the club and we have to grateful. “One group of people can be grateful for him and some people can say ‘Boo’, but I prefer that our fans are focused on supporting our players and get behind us.” Liverpool will approach the match with one eye on the Champions League trip to Porto 48 hours later, which looks likely to mean that Jordan Henderson is rested with Georginio Wijnaldum stepping into the heart of the midfield. “Jordan can always dig in and his attitude is outstanding, but he has had an injury and in this specific situation after injury it would not be perfect,” said Klopp. The Saints have gone six games unbeaten in all competitions since Van Dijk forced through his exit but Pellegrino maintains that they will have to be almost ‘perfect’ if they are to continue that run. In contrast, Liverpool have won only one of their last four games. Pellegrino added: “Liverpool is a huge possibility for us and a really tough side. We want to learn and we want to improve from our experience away and we have to improve in different aspects. “When you play against this side you have to do everything perfectly to try to beat a Champions League team like Liverpool. But we are in a good situation to try to play against them. Hopefully we feel at the end of the game that we are growing and we are continuing with this feeling.”