To Elland back KLOPP NIGHTMARE A LONG WAY FROM OVER
Produced a virtuoso performance in attack and defence to help Wigan beat his former club Leeds Rhinos in Super League.
GREGOR TOWNSEND
The Scotland boss has been announced as the British and Irish Lions attack coach of the summer tour of South Africa. Well deserved.
ZINEDINE ZIDANE
Real Madrid manager has had his doubters but guided his side past Liverpool and into the Champions League semi-finals to outline his credentials as still being one of the best in the business.
SHOUT OF EUROPE: Champions League defeat has added to Klopp woes
CONSIDERING the reputation of Yorkshire folk, a trip to Elland Road is the last thing Jurgen Klopp needs.
The people of God’s own county are renowned for being somewhat frugal.
Things have to be earned and little is handed to visitors on a plate.
But nobody needs three points right now more than Liverpool boss Klopp, heading into tomorrow night’s crunch showdown with Leeds. Klopp’s problems have been well documented – and the Reds’ fall from grace this season has been nothing short of astonishing.
The champs have morphed into chumps in the space of seven mad months, to leave Klopp living through a nightmare of epic proportions.
Yet things could be about to get even worse before they get better for the German as he looks to a future few on Merseyside could even contemplate, let alone talk about.
The Reds will take on Marcelo Bielsa’s rapidly improving Leeds team languishing in sixth place in the table and facing a desperate battle just to secure Champions League football next season. West Ham and Chelsea are above them while Tottenham and neighbours Everton lurk behind in what is now one of the most fiercely-contested scraps for a top-four finish on record.
But failure is not an option for Klopp.
The club is expected to announce annual losses of £40million when the next financial figures are released, while missing out on a seat at the top table of European football will cost them another £80m in revenue.
To make matters worse, Klopp now presides over an ageing squad in need of an injection of youthful, top-class quality this summer.
His captain Jordan Henderson (below) will be 31 before the start of next season while Sadio Mane will turn 30 during the same campaign.
Georginio Wijnaldum, also 30, is out of contract this summer and has refused to sign a new one while recent signings Thiago and Naby Keita have been hugely underwhelming. And then there is Mo Salah.
The Egyptian talisman still has two years left on his current deal but has been flirting with Real Madrid and Barcelona.
Yet who is going to meet the asking price after Covid-19 – and are Anfield bosses prepared to hand him a new and improved deal that would take him well into his 30s? Will Klopp be given significant funds to spend on new signings? And even if he is, who could he attract to the club if there is no Champions League football to entice them with?
What a pickle.
The truth is that Klopp is staring into a black hole while up the East Lancs Road Pep Guardiola has polished a Man City team for the ages that looks set to dominate domestic and European football for the foreseeable future. Somehow Klopp has to secure Champions League football to salvage something from the rubble left behind this season, which involves beating Leeds tomorrow. The same Leeds side that embarrassed City last weekend at The Etihad. It promises to be the biggest game of Klopp’s season. But there is one thing that he can be grateful for as, believe it or not, things could be worse – Elland Road could be packed to the rafters.