Klopp Leaving This Summer. Holy Cow 😱

Plus ... Holy Cow! 😱 (UPDATED)

So, a nice easy Friday morning. Just about to make a coffee.

WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCKING FUCK?!

😱

I was only thinking the other day about how Pep Lijnders may want to replace Jürgen Klopp, but feeling unsure if he’s ready. Then, Klopp is going at the end of the season, with Lijnders and Peter Krawietz, as well as elite development coach Vitor Matos.

Holy cow.

(I’ll continue to add to this piece as the news sinks in.)

In a sense it’s a great time to leave when so many players have come through, and the squad has never looked bigger or better; with the team top of the table and presumably favourites in three cup competitions. (But also, feels like a great time to be the boss of these lads.)

I can only assume Liverpool have someone in place for the entire backroom staff to change. That’s huge, too. It sounds like this was in the works many months ago, so the club will have had time to make soundings, if not firm plans.

Whether or not Lijnders would be ready or have the heft and personality to succeed, as the kind of rare succession of a Bob Paisley following a Bill Shankly, the continuity goes with him and Matos; whereas Krawietz is tied to Klopp, and more understandable.

That also sounds like they’re moving, as one, onto a new project, but it could also mean a successor is in place with his own backroom staff. Unless Lijnders knew he wouldn’t get the job and he’s now ready to strike out on his own again after one failed shot about six years ago.

Xabi Alonso? Roberto De Zerbi?

There aren’t many candidates who can get even close to matching Klopp and handling the pressure, but those two seem the most promising, with Alonso a Liverpool legend. They play the right football.

Of course, a new Director of Football is required too, and they will need to work with the new manager, and ideally, be on the same page. That was always a complicating factor.

(Just to add, could Michael Edwards return, given that he, like Klopp, needed a break; and also, he left because of some of the tensions around transfers? Maybe unlikely, but it would be a chance to establish some in-house continuity, even after a couple of years of being gone.)

There’s also a crossroads for Mo Salah and the club in the summer, too. A chance to cash in on silly money if he wanted to leave, with just one year left on his contract. He’s been sensational this season, but it’ll be a make-or-break summer for his future.

Today’s news brings uncertainty to this season, but it will be one hell of an emotional send off. The players can focus on giving everything back to the manager, not that they ever sold him short.

But nine years is a long time. Almost the joint-longest with Paisley, bar a couple of months, since Shankly’s 15 years, in an era of less pressure and scrutiny. Klopp said he is tired, and we should respect that. I was only thinking recently how he’s getting up towards 60 now, and the game is changing as fast and as furiously as the play itself.

“I can understand that it's a shock for a lot of people in this moment, when you hear it for the first time, but obviously I can explain it - or at least try to explain it.

“I love absolutely everything about this club, I love everything about the city, I love everything about our supporters, I love the team, I love the staff. I love everything. But that I still take this decision shows you that I am convinced it is the one I have to take.

“It is that I am, how can I say it, running out of energy. I have no problem now, obviously, I knew it already for longer that I will have to announce it at one point, but I am absolutely fine now. I know that I cannot do the job again and again and again and again.

“After the years we had together and after all the time we spent together and after all the things we went through together, the respect grew for you, the love grew for you and the least I owe you is the truth - and that is the truth."

The hardest thing to replace will be Klopp’s charisma and force of nature, which led to the bond with the fans, but there are other ways to achieve success. There are always great managers emerging, if you can find them and procure them. Alonso, for example, already has the love of the fans.

A super-talented young manager with no real CV to speak of would be dangerous, especially if not linked to the club. It’s hard to replace a legend like Klopp, but harder still if you have no prior success to fall back upon, or no “love” from the fans to see you through a difficult spell. All managers come under pressure, but to follow someone this elite generally requires some insulation, via CV or fan adulation; and they must be able to handle the Big Club Pressure, unlike some eternal mid-level managers like Roy Hodgson and, at Man United, David Moyes.

Under Klopp, the last game of the season is normally the time to contest a league title or Champions League trophy; this time it will be bid a very fond farewell, after nine years, to the Reds’ best manager of recent times, and up there with the very, very best the world has ever seen, given his incredible achievements with Mainz and Dortmund too, never on the biggest budget.

Auf Wiedersehen, mein Herr.

(But before then, let’s have some fun!)

Jürgen Klopp Press Conference and Interview

Subscribers can use this thread to make sense of something I literally only discovered 10 minutes ago. I’ll try and make more sense of it too.