Is this another seven year itch for Klopp? Scratch beneath the surface and it’s worrying for Reds

It’s incredible that Liverpool’s top scorer in the Prem since the World Cup is Leicester defender Wout Faes... thanks to his two own goals

JURGEN KLOPP left his first managerial post, at Mainz in the German Bundesliga, after seven years in the post.

He signed off from Borussia Dortmund, who he led to two titles, after seven years.

Klopp is now approaching the back end of seven full seasons in charge at Liverpool and, for the first time, fans and pundits are starting to wonder if we are witnessing the last days of a glorious era at Anfield.

Let’s get it straight: I don’t think Klopp will leave and I hope he stays at Anfield to build a new team.

If and when the time comes for him to part ways with Liverpool, he deserves the dignity of walking away on his own terms after everything he has achieved on Merseyside.

All great teams come to the end of an era and it’s clear that the empire Klopp built badly needs renovation.

At the moment Liverpool are in such a state of transition that I would make bitter rivals Everton slight favourites to win the Merseyside derby on Monday night, even though it’s at Anfield.

If Sean Dyche can extract as much energy and intensity as they showed in their 1-0 win against Arsenal in his first game as Everton manager, Liverpool will have to run their socks off to put one over the neighbours across Stanley Park.

And I’m not sure Klopp will be able to flick a switch and restore the heavy-metal power which left them streets ahead of everyone else, apart from Manchester City, for about four years.

It is easy to say, with hindsight, that the £130million Liverpool spent on Darwin Nunez and Cody Gakpo would have been better spent on refurbishing an ageing midfield.

Add Luis Diaz and Diogo Jota and they have spent £200m on new forwards in the last twoand-a-half years.

The revamped front line has yet to click, partly because Jota and Diaz have been out injured for a long time, and it will not happen overnight.

But it is incredible, at a club of Liverpool’s history and resources, that their top scorer in the Premier League since the World Cup is Leicester’s Belgian defender Wout Faes, thanks to his two own goals at Anfield on December 30.

And it underlines how special the front three’s chemistry was when Sadio Mane, Roberto Firmino and Mo Salah formed the best forward line in the world.

Increasingly it is clear how much they have missed Mane, and Salah has rarely touched the heights of a three-time Golden Boot winner since he signed his new contract last year.

I love Klopp’s passion, his fistpumping and chest-beating towards the Kop, and how he assembled a wonderful side that went so close to the Quadruple last season. But I don’t think his team has evolved quickly enough, and three games without scoring a goal tells its own story.

To look at the table and see Brentford, Fulham and Brighton above Liverpool, more than halfway through the campaign, doesn’t seem real.

I think they miss Michael Edwards, the sporting director who left last June, because his recruitment was fantastic.

And when a team has drifted away from the relentless press, high up the pitch, which was its trademark for so long, it’s not easy just to rekindle it at the drop of a hat. Where Firmino used to drop in as a false No.9, with Mane and Salah making runs from wide outside-to-in, right now Liverpool do not carry the same threat in the box.

The worry now is that Liverpool could not only miss out on the top four but miss out on European football next season altogether.

Klopp is one of the greatest managers of the Premier League era and you simply cannot sack him after winning the title, the Champions League, FA Cup, and EFL Cup, while reaching four other major finals and twice missing out on the title by a single point, once despite a haul of 97 points in a season that saw them lose just one game

Are we are reaching the end of another seven-year cycle?

I hope not – but Liverpool’s results must improve fast.