https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/european/liverpool-vs-roma-Jürgen-klopp-bill-shankly-champions-league-win-goals-feature-a8320821.html
Jürgen Klopp is not Bill Shankly but may prove to be the closest thing to him yet.
Listen to those in his corner often enough and you learn that Jürgen Klopp has an unshakable commitment to his own instincts, not only when choosing which path to follow but which ones he should not. Bayern Munich is likely to fall into the second category. Having the fortitude to say “no” comes easily and actually, this defines him.
In his own words, Klopp will “never vote for the right”, yet even with the best attempts of Liverpudlians to cast him as a socialist, a picture of a liberal develops, albeit one with an acute social conscience. It might not be enough for some, for those who claim liberalism is dead in politics and society, making them wonder why the hell is should exist anywhere in sport, particularly in a key leadership position.
Klopp, though, has many followers. He is a German fifty-year-old who was born in the 1960s. He was 22 when the Berlin Wall fell, uniting the country under one banner. This was a period not without its problems, but it did try to be inclusive and this in part goes some way to explaining Klopp the person as well as Klopp the manager because both are the same.
He does not rush judgements as Simon Mignolet should really be humble enough to admit one day. Instead Klopp gives as many chances as possible, sometimes more than others would. He places faith in young people; he does not overspend but he spends when he feels there is value. He is caring, but he will come down hard on those who let him down or if he thinks you are wrong.
He is decisive rather than ruthless.
When he says “no”, however, he means it. Mamadou Sakho flouting the rules? That didn’t happen for long. Liverpool supporters throwing objects at a billionaire’s bus? It stops because he told them to stop. Brexit and Britain putting up its own invisible wall between itself and Europe? A bad idea.
As someone with a track record for making the right decisions in life, decisions that have taken him from a modest country background to being manager of major urban centre football clubs while remaining the same person he was in Glatten only wiser, maybe he is worth listening to him about issues that transcend football even if the instinct is to say it’s a bit like Theresa May blabbering about Mohamed Salah’s continued brilliance. Klopp does not start every sentence with, “Let me be absolutely clear…” only to be as clear as the Mersey river about what he really thinks or wants to do.
Bill Shankly spoke about ideology when he was Liverpool’s manager but he did not like politicians. It was only in retirement when he entertained Harold Wilson, the Labour Prime Minister on a series of radio shows. Klopp is not an incarnate of Shankly but in terms of being about his own values and transmitting them not only to his players but those who support Liverpool and even those that don’t – considering too what he might yet achieve – he is the closest manager Liverpool have had to the one that first led the club out of the darkness and into the light.
Klopp's Liverpool is a "cult", as Marco Streller, the former Swiss centre forward said on German television last month. Liverpool, of course, is where the cult of the manager began under the guidance of Shankly.
In Germany, indeed, there is a feeling that if Klopp decided to run for president, his popularity would result in him getting voted in. If Merseyside was to break free of Brexit Britain and announce itself as an independent people’s republic like some in the area half-jokingly suggest it should, Klopp - with a Champions League title behind him - would have the the level of backing to take office.
Klopp’s “Make Anfield Great Again” campaign has been rolling since 2015. Only this one has substance. Three weeks before Klopp arrived on Merseyside, a full-strength Liverpool’s confidence was so low, the team could not beat Carlisle United over 120 minutes, scoring only once against fourth tier opposition.
Klopp, so usually as expressive as anyone else in the stadium, was one of the calmest last night, as goals number one, two, three and four flew in, taking Liverpool to the brink of a final that nobody at the start of the season would have predicted. When Roberto Firmino headed Liverpool’s fifth goal, Klopp looked at the floor, biting the zip on his jacket, as if this position is a natural one to be in.
Klopp has given hope where there was previously very little. Even if Liverpool do not win a sixth European crown – even if from here Roma end up going through because their two late goals have given them a sniff of belief – it does not mean Klopp has failed
Klopp is building a team in the finest Liverpool traditions, one with a group of players you wouldn’t have necessarily pinned together and claimed confidently they’d have a chance. Roma were the perfect opponent to connect the dots in many ways because in 1984 when Liverpool went to the Eternal City and beat them on their own patch, the backgrounds of the players involved were similar to now.
Liverpool’s goalkeeper came from Vancouver via the Rhodesian bush war, the right back was on the verge of giving up a career in football when he signed from Northampton, Alan Kennedy – scorer of the winning penalty kick – had started his Liverpool career so badly that Bob Paisley suggested they’d shot the wrong Kennedy; Mark Lawrenson was the lanky kid at Preston North End that nobody rated who only got his chance in the reserves because of sickness, Ronnie Whelan came from Home Farm, and Alan Hansen was thought of as being lazy by his manager, the formidable Bertie Auld – one of Celtic’s Lisbon Lions. Kenny Dalglish, in fairness, was signed as a star, then there was Sammy Lee whose mum made him beans on toast before every home game. Ian Rush would become the club’s greatest goalscorer but 18 months before Rome he was wondering whether he’d make it at Liverpool at all and could have signed for Crystal Palace. Finally, there was Craig Johnston, who trained alone in a cold Middlesbrough car park when Jack Charlton roared at him, saying he was not good enough.
Liverpool’s current goalkeeper was recycled by Mainz after release from Manchester City, the right back is a teenager from the academy, the left back came from relegated Hull. There are three former Southampton players as well as one from Sunderland; Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain warmed the bench at Arsenal, then you have a veteran journeyman in James Milner. Mohamed Salah carries the star status and the fee of Dalglish but he is also a Chelsea reject. The centre forward was not spotted by any of Brazil’s top clubs and arrived from Hoffenheim without anyone other than Klopp really understanding his best position.
Klopp, like his most decorated predecessors, has an ability to turn pig iron into gold. He has seen what others have not been able to see. He has an advantage of understanding players more because he was one himself. He understands people because he was not famous until he became a manager. He understands that if you give people hope, you have a chance of succeeding as a manager.
It was during a conversation with the German journalist with Christoph Biermann, whose book focuses on the importance of football to the industrial Ruhr region, where he reflected on Borussia Dortmund’s improbable victory over Malaga in 2012. It was “one of those stories that will be told in twenty years-time,” he said. “My motivation is to collect that kind of stuff, for people to tell and retell it.” Football, he believes, is a shared collection of stories, a shared history and identity.
The number of stories told about Klopp are reaching Shankly-esque proportions. In writing his book, Feel the Noise, Raphael Honigstein, the well-connected German writer, found there was simply too much information to include. One of the stories that did not make the final edit came from a director at the car firm Opel, who told him about the occasion when Klopp stood on a stage before 10,000 workers at an annual convention. The talk developed into more of a performance and by the end, the audience were chanting his name.
Maybe everything you really need to know about Klopp is revealed when you later find that for these type of endorsements, he gives the proceeds to his assistants, Peter Krawietz and Željko Buvač, even though they are not involved. Klopp thinks he earns enough and without them, he would not be where he is. Again, it explains why he is loved and why he is followed. Now, it is Liverpudlians following him to Rome. For them, it is like entering the threshold of a promised land.
