KLOPP: UK OWN GOAL ON COVID ‘Learn from Germans’ blast for Boris
DAILY STAR SUNDAY, June 21, 2020
LIVERPOOL manager Jurgen Klopp has criticised Boris Johnson’s handling of the Covid-19 crisis.
The German says the Government’s response to the pandemic is the reason why the UK’s coronavirus death toll is one of the highest in the world.
And he said he had been shocked by the difference in how officials here have handled the virus compared with those in his home country.
He even claimed: “If aliens looked at us both from the outside, they would think we came from two different planets.”
Klopp said that Project Restart and the chance for him to deliver Liverpool’s first title in 30 years were always less important to him than keeping people safe.
And although he had worried that the Premier League season would be scrapped with his team 25 points clear at the top, his greater fear was over the way the pandemic was being fought here.
He said: “I was not worried for one second that the Government could cost us the title, because I was worried about the numbers who were dying – and I’m still worried.
“I didn’t vote for this government. This government was the choice of other people. And the problem I had was that I got the news from England and the news from Germany.”
He added: “From a personal point of view, I don’t understand why we started wearing face masks in closed areas on June 15 when five or six weeks ago all the other countries were doing it.
“You can argue about whether it makes sense to wear them, but all countries who started wearing face masks earlier have better, smaller casualty numbers than here in England. That’s the truth.
“When I see the numbers here in England and then in Germany, I think... Look, it’s not perfect in Germany. People have died and people have been ill. But in terms of living your life it is completely different.”
Klopp described the game he loves as “the most important thing of the least important things” when football was suspended in March with Liverpool just six points from clinching the title.
And he has continued to insist that public health must be at the top of everyone’s priority list. But the Kop boss admitted: “There were moments when nil and void came up – and I thought, ‘Wow.’
“That would have been really hard for me to take.” He said “the environment we have created inside the clubs now makes football safe”. But he added: “Outside the clubs? Yes, there are a few yards still to go.
“If you want to enter a shop in Germany but don’t wear a face mask then you aren’t allowed in.
“With a face mask you can go in all the shops you want. You can go to the hairdresser, wherever.
“They wear a face mask, you wear a face mask, and sometimes the people in the shop will wear even more protection like a screen.
“When I go to the petrol station here in England I am the only one wearing a face mask and I’m the only one with gloves – and I feel like an alien.
“I will not stop doing that until someone tells me it’s over.”