JURGEN KLOPP ADMITTED he has changed โeverythingโ in Liverpoolโs preparation for the Champions League final against Tottenham.
Klopp will be coaching his fourth European final, having made the Champions League final with Borussia Dortmund in 2013, as well as the 2016 Europa League decider and last yearโs Champions League showpiece with Liverpool.
Unfortunately, Klopp has come away empty-handed in all those contests, which arguably represents the biggest blemish in a distinguished managerial career.
And in anticipation of this yearโs final, Klopp says he has altered his squadโs actions in the build-up โ a stark change from before.
โEverything, we changed everything,โ Klopp said. โIn all the finals I played so far we did the build-up similar.
This time we changed everything. It is completely different. The only thing we kept the same was the starting time.โ
Kloppโs counterpart for the final, Mauricio Pochettino, has also dealt with questions over silverware despite being generally lauded for his work while overseeing Tottenham.
Pochettino claims that a manager should not just be judged on the number of trophies heโs won and while Klopp thinks that is true, he concedes the rest of the world may not agree.
โIf I said that then itโs fair play!โ Klopp said. โLook, I donโt care. I think heโs right but thatโs not important.
โThe thing is, you โ the outside world โ it is your right to judge us by what we win and what we donโt win.
โLook back in 20 years and nobody will talk about our brilliant season unless another team comes close to 97 points, or has more or less, then yes we maybe are mentioned again, but nobody will really speak about that.
โBut for me, as a person, it will stay forever. I will probably have 20 or 30 years career as a manager and then it is easy to remember it.
โI can really respect that and that is probably what Poch is like as well. But the outside world is like this and we have to accept that.
โBut to judge a coach by what he is winning is a silly thing because we all have different circumstances. We all have different teams, different clubs, we have to fight with or against different things, but nobody is interested in that.โ
Klopp went on to praise Pep Guardiola as the best manager in the world, but emphasised that it is not the Manchester City bossโs impressive trophy cabinet that distinguishes him.
โCoaches, most of us, judge each other not on trophies,โ Klopp continued. โAnd not because most of us donโt win, but because we know about the job.
We donโt say, โYou are the best, you are the bestโ. I donโt say Pep Guardiola is the best โ what I really think โ because he constantly wins the league that heโs in. Itโs the football they play, thatโs how it is, the things heโs doing, thatโs really good.
โWith wonderful resources, absolutely, but then having this clear stamp on a team that makes him, for me, the best coach in the world.โ
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Great piece Niall, but there are a couple of other points here.
If, for example, Kenny Egan was to travel to Baku, he could qualify for the Olympics, and would do so in the same weight division as Joe Ward. As a country can only enter one fighter in any weight class, as far as Iโm aware, Ward could then not even compete in Istanbul and his Olympic dreams would be dashed, even though he is European Champion. This is the same for any of our โstarsโ who miss out.
Also, if IABA were to send Ward and Moylette, the European champions would be seeded and thus get an easier draw. If they send other boxers in the same weight classes, that seeding is lost.
Thanks for the comments Gavin.
I see Kenny has declared that heโs stepping up to Heavyweight for this weekโs competition, which was presumably decided in order to avoid the clash with Ward that you mentioned. Itโll be interesting to see how it all plays out over the next week.