10 months ago
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Photo by David Horton - CameraSport via Getty Images
We now know when the Jürgen Klopp era ends and all that’s left is to try to enjoy the final few months.
You certainly wouldn’t have known it to watch Jürgen Klopp each matchday on the touchline and seemingly rejuvenated by his rebuilt Liverpool 2.0 and celebrating every win with as much passion as he ever had. And you wouldn’t have known it by the whispers in the press about a potential contract extension beyond 2026.
An era, though, is coming to an end. The Jürgen Klopp era at Liverpool is coming to an end. This will be the manager’s final season. His final few months. His final celebrations. Liverpool and the club’s fans have been amongst the luckiest in the world since he joined in 2015. All we can do now is try to enjoy what little time is left.
“I will leave the club at the end of the season,” he announced. “I can understand that’s a shock, when you hear it for the first time, but I can 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 am absolutely fine now, [but] I know that I cannot do the job again and again and again and again. After the years we had together I owe you is the truth—and that ’s it, pretty much.”
For anyone concerned about underlying health issues, Klopp insisted that he’s perfectly fine. He’s simply beginning to tire. He can see the end—or at least a point where it is difficult for him to imagine continuing to do the job. And rather than try to force himself to continue past that point, he’s bowing out on his own time and terms.
“I am okay,” he added. “I am healthy, nothing anybody has to be concerned about. I told the club already in November. I have to explain a little bit. A season starts and you plan pretty much next season already. When we sat there together talking about the next summer, the thought came up, ‘I am not sure I am here then anymore.’
“I was surprised myself. Last season was kind of a super-difficult season, [and] for me it was super-important I can help to bring this team back. It was all I was thinking. When I realised pretty early that happened, it’s a really good team with massive potential, then I could start thinking about myself again and that was the outcome.
“It is not what I want, it is just what I think is 100% right. That’s it. One thing I am really convinced of, if you have to make a decision like that, it is better you do it slightly early than slightly too late. Too late would have been absolutely the worst thing—Oh my God, that’s it, I cannot do it anymore—and we are in the middle of a season.
“This club, everything we built in the last years, is a wonderful platform, a wonderful basis for the future, and the only thing that could disturb that now is pretty much that you cannot make the right decisions because you are running out of time. That’s what was important to me: that I really inform everybody as early as possible.”
