How Klopp (and FSG) Destroyed Liverpool's Title Defence

“Only title you’ve ever won and you think you can give it the big one”

These were the words of Frank Lampard on the touchline to his opposite number, Jurgen Klopp, towards the end of the 2019/2020 season shortly after Liverpool had won the league. Klopp and his backroom team were being disrespectful towards Lampard during the game that broke out into an argument and led to Lampard making the comment. Liverpool under Klopp had tasted a little success that had gone to their heads and this was one of the early signs of it. It proved to be, among many other things, part of their downfall and one of the reasons that they blew their title defence. We'll go into more detail over the course of this article.

Transfer window

"We will not defend the title next season; we'll attack the next one" was what Jurgen Klopp said after Liverpool won the league the previous season. However, Liverpool's actions in the summer transfer window didn't reflect this sentiment.

Liverpool sold their fourth choice centre back, Dejan Lovren and decided against replacing him despite two of their remaining three senior centre backs having poor injury records in previous years and couldn't be relied on to stay fit for the entire season. Liverpool then strengthened in midfield (an area that they were well stocked in) and also strengthened in attack as well as brought in a backup left back. FSG didn't make additional funds available because of the impact that Covid-19 had on football finances but if they truly had faith in Klopp they would have invested some of their own money or found external sources of funding to back their man. This is a club that reportedly made a profit of £160m over the past 2 seasons so why they couldn't find the money to strengthen left many of their fans frustrated. It was confusing that if funds were so limited, why strengthen in an area that you have the most options in and not strengthen in a critical area that you desperately needed cover in? That decision lies solely at Klopp's feet.

Start of the season

It should be noted that Liverpool had a pre-season training camp in the summer, unlike the two Manchester clubs (that finished above them), who had European commitments going into the month of August 2020. 

The season started with a narrow 4-3 win against Premier League newcomers Leeds United. Although Liverpool won the game, Leeds deserved to get something out of the game for the way that they outplayed Liverpool for long spells in the game.

The match will be remembered for Virgil Van Dijk's mistake that led to Liverpool conceding a goal. Since the start of the 2018-19 season to that point, no outfield player had made more errors leading to goals in the Premier League than Liverpool's record signing.

Van Dijk’s three mistakes in that time were unmatched in the league, perhaps suggesting complacency was creeping not only into his game, but that of the team as well. It was visible that the Premier League win had gone to their heads. 

A few games later, Liverpool went to Aston Villa and conceded 7 goals, the first time that a defending champion had conceded 7 goals. Great teams are hungry for success each and every season but this Liverpool team already seemed content with winning only a league tile the season before and were already showing no ambition of trying to "attack the title" as their manager put it. It's worth noting that Virgil Van Dijk played in this game. 

Below is a quote from Roy Keane speaking about Manchester United's treble win in 1999. 

 “For months afterwards, the treble haunted us wherever we went. Well into the following season, we were being saluted as heroes, history-makers, better than the 1968 team, the team of the century — signing photographs with the three trophies, talking about that ‘great night’ that we’ll never forget. ‘Hello’, I thought. Overexcited, maybe, but what the fuck are we going to do next year? Is that it? We’ve made history. Now we pack it in? It doesn’t matter what we do now, we’ll never be forgotten.”

Liverpool fans kept on going on about their team being 'mentality monsters' yet the contrast between someone that played in a great team and players from Liverpool that let success go to their heads is stark.

Fixture Scheduling

All Jurgen Klopp did week after week was complain about the fixture schedule. Instead of getting on with it like the remaining 19 clubs in the league did for the most part, Klopp used every opportunity to complain about how the fixture scheduling was unfair on Liverpool as they were getting the early game on a Saturday (which is a prime spot broadcasting spot) after playing midweek in the champions league. Liverpool were not the only club that this happened to and the irony of it was that the club hierarchy agreed to it with the broadcasters. Instead of blaming the broadcasters, he should have taken aim at his employers.

Injuries

Another aspect of pandemic football that Klopp and Liverpool couldn’t deal with. Just like the fixture schedule that I mentioned above, Liverpool couldn’t deal with injuries. Liverpool had been affected by injuries throughout the season but Klopp and the fans made it seem as if this has never happened in the history of the game and that no club has ever had injuries.

Playing football during the pandemic meant that it was a truncated season so more often than not teams in European Competitions were playing games during midweek and on the weekend. There were no breaks in between games and managers had to adapt to the situation. 

Players needed to rest in between games and squads needed to be rotated, something that Klopp needed to adjust to. If you have players that get contact injuries like in the case of Van Dijk against Everton then it’s understandable, however, when you have so many muscle injuries then there’s a good chance that the club is doing something wrong with the players. This is where sports science comes in and an assessment should have been done immediately. Liverpool’s injury list kept on growing and it seemed that nothing was being done about it.

This was a constant excuse that was made by Liverpool and their fans and instead of accepting their situation and trying to improve going forward they continued to choose to use it as an excuse.

You have to bear in mind that a lot of their players have been injury prone, not just last season but throughout their stay at the club. Gomez, Matip, Keita, Oxlade-Chamberlain and Shaqiri to name a few have had regular spells on the sidelines. This isn’t something new to last season. It’s something that should have been looked at a long time ago.

Their injury problems were compounded by Klopp’s decision making. He chose to play one of their best players of the season, Diogo Jota, in a dead rubber Champions League game where Liverpool had already topped the group. The decision to play him was bizarre at best when all Klopp had done up to that point was complain about the fixture schedule and his injury list.

Another perplexing decision was when the Aston Villa squad had a Covid-19 outbreak and their manager, coaches and players all had to isolate. This led Villa to field a reserve team made up of a lot of youth players, some as young as 17. Klopp had the perfect opportunity to rest his first team players but instead chose to play a strong side that, as expected, romped to victory.

Despite being short of numbers up front due to the injury of Diogo Jota, Klopp decided to let Takumi Minamino go out on loan. Despite Minamino having his best game in a Liverpool shirt in December’s 7-0 win over Crystal Palace, he didn’t get a look in after that and with Liverpool already being short of numbers, it was a baffling decision to let Minamino leave and not even give him a run in the team after a good performance.

Tactics

The turn of the year signalled a turn around in Liverpool’s form. Liverpool went on a run of 6 straight home league defeats after not losing for 68 consecutive home league games. This was the first time that Liverpool had lost 6 home league games in the top flight in the club’s 129 year history.  

Once again, during their loss of form in the second half of the season, Klopp couldn’t get to grips with the situation and did little to change it. There are many things that he could have done. Fabinho and Henderson playing at centre back meant that Liverpool lost their bite and influence in midfield. He could have put them back into midfield and played 3 at the back with a deep lying midfielder covering the inexperienced centre backs. Nat Philips was dropped after he had made a mistake in a game and it was only when he got back in the team that Liverpool’s fortunes began to change. Not trusting him enough was another mistake made by Klopp and what must have been alarming for fans was his unwillingness to change tactically despite their being little to lose from trying something different.  

Winter Transfer Window

At the beginning of the winter transfer window the noise out of Liverpool were that they weren’t going to sign a centre back despite the injuries suffered to their senior centre backs. Virgil Van Dijk had already been ruled out for the season mad Joe Gomez was already ruled out for most of the season (he never played again). The only fit centre back at that point was Joel Matip and I mentioned above that he isn’t a player that you can rely on as he has had numerous injury problems while at the club. By the end of the window Liverpool were scrambling to sign a centre back and managed to get a 20 year old Ozan Kabak on a loan and Ben Davies for a reported £2m fee. There was just no foresight from Edwards, Klopp and those that run the club that having signed these players at the beginning of the window, knowing the issues that you had, could have made a difference as they would have used that time to adjust and settle in. Ben Davies picked up an injury shortly after signing (see above where I wrote that Liverpool have an issue with injuries) and never played a game for the club.

Excuses

As the season wore on, excuses came out of every corner of Liverpool. As I explained above, the manager and fans blamed the fixture schedule and injuries throughout the season but it got to a point where it felt like they complained about everything. They blamed VAR despite VAR making correct decisions and their fans kept on saying how there was an agenda against them.

Real Madrid were playing at their training ground for the season as their stadium was under construction. Liverpool met Real Madrid at the Quarter Final stage of the Champions League and after Madrid won the game 3-1 Klopp started with his excuses:

According to the Daily Mail, Klopp said: "It must be a really tricky task for Real Madrid at Anfield.

"This was strange tonight because it was really difficult with the stadium (at Madrid's training ground) but Anfield is at least a proper stadium and it will be good for us."

To deflect from his own team’s failures Klopp then took a pop at Manchester United’s penalty record:

"I hear now that Manchester United had more penalties in two years than I had in five-and-a-half years. I’ve no idea if that’s my fault, or how that can happen."

At this point it was evident that he was feeling the heat and Manchester United were getting under his skin.

Former Premier League referee Mark Clattenburg hit back at Klopp saying that if he is insinuating that Manchester United’s players go down after inviting contact then Klopp shouldn’t pretend that his players don’t do the same:

"If he was highlighting the ease with which some United players go down in the penalty area then, yes, I believe he was making a valid point. Even if it does ignore similar suspicions about some of his stars."

"That is exactly what Sadio Mané did when going down too easily under Kyle Walker-Peters' challenge during last Monday's 1-0 defeat at Southampton," he wrote.

"The ball was running out of play and, in a different position with the chance to score, I believe Mane would have ridden the challenge."

"He sounds like a hypocrite if he is suggesting United's players are looking to win penalties. The likes of Mo Salah and Mane are just as capable of employing similar tactics."

With Manchester United top of the league going into their clash with arch rivals Liverpool, Klopp is getting "edgy", Clattenburg says.

"Not since Fergie have we seen such a blatant attempt to influence a referee ahead of a big game. Klopp wasn't doing this last season when Liverpool were winning every week," he wrote.

The best excuse all season by far was how not having fans at Anfield affected Liverpool. It didn’t affect the other 19 clubs, just Liverpool! Everyone had the same advantage when playing away and the same disadvantage when playing at home. Liverpool are not a special case in this incident. Why they couldn’t adapt to it like others clubs instead of using it as a constant excuse is anyone’s guess.

Thiago

As I mentioned earlier, signing Thiago ahead of a centre back didn’t make sense as Liverpool were well stocked in that area. Thiago didn’t have the best of starts, getting injured early on in the Merseyside derby that kept him on the sidelines for a while but when he came back he looked like a fraction of the player that we had come to know at Bayern Munich. He didn’t start either of the games against Real Madrid and must have been wondering why he had left a successful club like Bayern Munich for a step down to Liverpool. Fans of the club kept saying how he needed X player and Y player to play alongside him to ‘unlock’ him despite him being called the midfielder that was going to unlock defences in tight games.

John Barnes accused him of “slowing Liverpool down” and Jamie Carragher described him as “a defensive liability.”

He registered no assists during season and scored a solitary goal in a forgettable season for him.

Liverpool bizarrely let Gini Wijnaldum, who was their best midfielder run down his contract and leave for free at the end of the season. A strange decision by Micheal Edwards who we’ll discuss later.

Super League

“We believe we have demonstrated a willingness to listen carefully, reconsider our position, and act decisively. The unique and sacred relationship between Liverpool Football Club and its supporters has always been foremost in our minds. It represents the heartbeat of this extraordinary football club. More than any other factor by far, that bond is what drives us to work tirelessly on behalf of the club and its future.”

This was an apology from Liverpool’s principal owner John W Henry on February 10, 2016 after Liverpool fans had protested the clubs intention to charge fans £77 for a match.

Since then Liverpool wanted to use the furlough scheme to pay their non-playing staff which they made a U-turn and apologised for. This is among many other questionable things they've done during their tenure that I've highlighted in my previous blogs.

It was rumoured that Liverpool's owners were one of the main drivers of the Super League that was formed with some of the other major European Clubs. A club that acts like they have the best interests of the club and city at heart but act in the total opposite way. This move was shut down immediately by fans of English teams and the withdrawal from the Super League was swift for English clubs. Liverpool are not solely to blame for the Super League idea, the blame should be shared equally, but, if you look at the Glazers, they are who they are and don't pretend to be people that they are not. Their motivations are clear to see. In the case of FSG it feels like they say one thing but their actions portray people that are totally different.

The first game after the announcement of the Super League was Liverpool vs Leeds where Liverpool players were given a hard time by Leeds fans on their way to the stadium. The owners hung their manager out to dry as he had to face questions from the media. As usual Klopp eventually tried to deflect from the situation by having a dig at Gary Neville.

Neville criticised both Liverpool and his old club Manchester United, stating that the Merseyside's club's anthem 'You'll Never Walk Alone' rang hollow after the breakaway plans.

While not endorsing the Super League plan Klopp felt criticism of his side was unfair, personally naming Neville and saying he wished the pundit was "in a hotseat somewhere and not always where the most money is".

The Liverpool boss made clear he and his players had nothing to do with the breakaway, but there were fireworks when it went back to the studio.

A clearly angry Neville hit back: "Why? Why is it not fair?

"I've handed enough insults out over the years to Liverpool, yesterday was nothing to do with insulting Liverpool Football Club I don' t know why I'm living in his head to be honest with you.

"I don't know what spiked him, yesterday was an impassioned plea from me about football and protecting football in this country, my biggest disappointment was with Manchester United and Liverpool.

"I think I've equally distributed enough criticism to both clubs in the last 24 hours so I don't know what his problem is.

"He talks about a hot seat: I had a 25 year career at Manchester United, 11 year career at Sky. I worked hard for that, I haven't been handed it, I haven't gone where the most money is.

"I didn't have choices. Sir Alex Ferguson didn't say, 'Gary do you want to stay here every single year?'.

"So I have no idea what he's going on about. I employ 600 people in the city, I tried to look after them during a pandemic. Is that not a hot enough seat for him?

"He's done a great job at Liverpool, I've got no problem with Jurgen Klopp. I loved his team but the fact of the matter is he's spiky, he's been let down by his owners.

"His owners have thrown him under a bus. That man, to be fair we're on the same page.

"We're on the same team but the fact of the matter is he can't say what he wants to say. And I can."

Fans Abusing Young Players

I spoke about this in my last blog and it's sad that I am speaking about it again.

Teenage fullback, Neco Williams, briefly deactivated his account after coming in for criticism in the wake of Liverpool ’s 7-2 win over Lincoln City in the EFL Cup.

Liverpool fans have a history of turning on their players and abusing them, something that no player should have to endure let alone a young kid of 19 years old.

They portray themselves as the best fans in the world but they are anything but.

Micheal Edwards Is Overrated

Micheal Edwards gets spoken about as some sort of maestro that does everything right on the business side of the club. It's about time that we debunk this myth. While his outgoings at the club have been very good, the business that him and Klopp have done of getting players in is  overrated. If you break down the signings that they've made up to the winter transfer window last season, only 8 out of the 20 (40%) have turned out to be good signings. The jury is still out on a few with some really shocking signings as well. 

The good signings have been Sadio Mane, Joel Matip, Georginio Wijnaldum, Mohamed Salah, Andy Robertson, Virgil van Dijk,Fabinho, Alisson Becker

The unsuccessful signings have been Ragnar Klavan, Dominic Solanke, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Naby Keita, Xherdan Shaqiri, Adrian, Takumi Minamino, Kostas Tsimikas, Thiago, Loris Karius, Ben Davies

Pepijn Ljinders

Liverpool fans blaming Pep Ljinders for their failures is bizarre. If you are blaming an assistant manager for your failures then shouldn't you laud him for your success? 

Pep Ljinders isn't the problem, Klopp is responsible for Liverpool's failures last season and the responsibility lies at his feet. The problem for Liverpool fans is that they can't openly blame Klopp as they will get get abused by their own fans like they do with some of their players so the fans that want to speak the truth about Klopp take it out on Pep Ljinders. 

You have to feel for Pep Ljinders, this is the first time in my life that fans of a club have blamed an assistant manager for their failures.

Finishing In the Top 4

Liverpool scraped to a top 4 finish on the final day of the season and saw it as some kind of success. Their season was a failure no matter which way you look at it. Manchester City won the league because they adapted the best. Liverpool's manager was out of his depth for long parts of the season and his failure to adapt coupled with his inability to change was the reason for their failure. Blaming VAR, scheduling, injuries etc. isn't going to change that.

Conclusion

To conclude, I leave with the fable, Don't Argue With Donkeys:

The donkey said to the tiger:

 - "The grass is blue". The tiger replied: - "No, the grass is green." The discussion heated up, and the two decided to submit him to arbitration, and for this they went before the lion, the King of the Jungle.

Already before reaching the forest clearing, where the lion was sitting on his throne, the donkey began to shout: - "His Highness, is it true that the grass is blue?". The lion replied: - "True, the grass is blue."

The donkey hurried and continued: - "The tiger disagrees with me and contradicts and annoys me, please punish him." The king then declared: - "The tiger will be punished with 5 years of silence."

The donkey jumped cheerfully and went on his way, content and repeating: - "The Grass Is Blue"... The tiger accepted his punishment, but before he asked the lion: - "Your Majesty, why have you punished me?, after all, the grass is green."

The lion replied: - "In fact, the grass is green." The tiger asked: - "So why are you punishing me?". The lion replied: - "That has nothing to do with the question of whether the grass is blue or green.

The punishment is because it is not possible for a brave and intelligent creature like you to waste time arguing with a donkey, and on top of that come and bother me with that question."

The worst waste of time is arguing with the fool and fanatic who does not care about truth or reality, but only the victory of his beliefs and illusions. Never waste time on arguments that don't make sense...

There are people who, no matter how much evidence and evidence we present to them, are not in the capacity to understand, and others are blinded by ego, hatred and resentment, and all they want is to be right even if they are not.

When ignorance screams, intelligence is silent. Your peace and quiet are worth more.

A wise man said to me, "never argue with a Liverpool fan..."