Jurgen Klopp launched into an impassioned defence of Liverpool’s transfer policy after acknowledging the Reds will need to make a number of transfers next summer.
Having nearly won an unprecedented quadruple last year, Liverpool are already out of both domestic cups and on the verge of Champions League elimination after losing 5-2 to Real Madrid at Anfield in the first leg of their round-of-16 tie in midweek. Meanwhile, they are at risk of failing to finish in the top four this season, with the Reds currently down in eighth and seven points behind fourth-placed Tottenham Hotspur.
Speaking at his pre-match press conference ahead of Saturday’s trip to Crystal Palace, Klopp insisted Liverpool weren’t in a position to make mass changes sooner, while disappointing campaign has not changed the club’s transfer plans for the summer.
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And well-aware of what needs to be done to his squad, he revealed that was partly why he signed a new contract with the club last year, before he explained Liverpool’s approach to transfers and conceded it might have to be adapted in the future.
“Yes (transfers are needed), what would be the other scenario? No, (our plans changed) not so much,” he said. “It’s not so much. We are all influenced by the things that happened recently.
“Of course, we are not that dumb. It’s not like, ‘Today is not good and now we have to change.’ This is clear, it was always clear.
“This team has a wonderful history. The way this club is led is by not splashing the money and having a look at if it works out or not. Our transfers always have to be on point. So that makes it really tricky where we cannot make four transfers before we know who will leave the club.
“Last year I said it a couple of times, and I don’t know how many times I can say it, I knew it would be tricky. And that was one of the main reasons why I signed a new contract, to make sure people who are not on top of all that have to discuss and then ‘he leaves next year’.
“And not because I’m that great, just because imagine the same situation with another coach. Everybody would have said, ‘Bring Klopp back’. It’s good, we don’t have that. Some of them want me out, it’s fine. I can understand that as well, but it’s not about that. It’s just about the club and the stability.
“Last year was not a season for a big change. We played until the last moment. If you want to change again, this club, we can’t just bring in new players and then realise later, ‘Oh, nobody wants to leave.’ It doesn’t work, it doesn’t work like that.
“That’s why it’s not possible to start it early because we had final after final after final. Played the season until the last minute, played the Champions League final. Then we had a short break, then we have a lot of injuries, and then the World Cup.
“All the problems we knew we would have, this came on top. And now we are in it and I know it’s too long. For me it’s too long because I have to always face you in the press conferences.
“Believe me, I don’t like to talk about it all the time. But I have to think it all the time. But that’s not as bad as talking about it to be honest, because I don’t have to read it the next day. That’s the situation, I cannot change it.
“Now the people are not happy. We try to fight through and make the best of this season, that’s the idea. And stay in the period as good as a person as you can.
“If I said, the better you behave in the moment like this, the better the times will be after it. The more useful the bad times are because they have to be useful otherwise they are completely useless.
“Imagine that, in all our lives that we wouldn’t have learned from our failures. We wouldn’t have learned from the moments when things didn’t go well. We would not be the same people. So we have to learn from this as well and we will.
“But now we are in this heated atmosphere where we lose a game, ‘Everybody out!’ We win a game, ‘Oh, give him a new contract!’ I’m too old for that. We have to make our own plans and that’s what we do.
“But based on the way this club is led. It’s obviously different to other clubs, that’s how it is. But it worked out so far and we have to see if it will work still or if we have to adapt. Let me say it like that.
“But that’s something for us in the offices, when we are not in the training pitch. And for us, from my conversations with the owners. But that’s it, nothing else. It’s just work.”
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