The Sunday Times May 1, 2022 9supporters’ hearts that when Klopp
leaves, Steven Gerrard will be ready
to take over. But the former
England midfielder might not even
want to try to fill the unfillable
shoes and prefer for there to be a
buffer or two before he gets the
keys to Klopp’s office.
It is an office which has on its
bookshelf the Oxford English
Dictionary, so it was no surprise
that when he revealed details of his
new deal, Klopp said he was not
only delighted but also “humbled,
blessed, privileged and excited”.
The fans have started singing a
version of I Feel Fine by The Beatles
in Klopp’s honour, and he even
referenced the chant — which
includes the line, “I’m so glad that
Jürgen is a Red” — when
announcing his extended contract.
“I’m in love with here and I feel
fine,” he said.
Back in 2016, Klopp made it plain
that he was uncomfortable with the
fans singing his name, but he likes
the new chant and the connection it
has with local culture, and his
acceptance of it, combined with his
new contract, give the club
momentum beyond mere results.
It feels as if Liverpool have
broken through a barrier and are
about to become a dynasty rather
than simply the club that tries to
block the path of Manchester City.the adult population are on antide-
pressants, because not every GP sur-
gery has a mental health nurse and
GPs have 15 minutes per appoint-
ment, so the easiest thing is to hand
out a pill.
“This mental health campaigning,
it’s just noise. And it drives me insane.
“More training of practitioners,
therapists, counsellors — that’s what
we need. I did an NHS thing the other
day and the woman organising said,
‘Tony, can you not mention addiction.
Talk about your panic attacks, your
PTSD, your anxiety, your depres-
sions, but for f*** sake don’t talk
about addiction, we’ve got no money
and resources.. .” Sorry, Jonathan,
I’ve gone off on one... ”
Hearing him addressing passion-
ately a cause he has devoted himself
to, since going sober at the age of 29,
in 1996, takes you back in a funny way
to the player Adams was. Front foot,
fearless, a leader, a one-off. Those
qualities underpinned his 66 England
caps, 672 Arsenal appearances, four
league titles and six cups won before
retirement in 2002. His coaching
career, at Wycombe Wanderers,
Portsmouth, Gabala in Azerbaijan,
Granada in Spain and Feyenoord
(where he worked with the academy
players), was more chequered, but no
less colourful.
His show is “50 per cent mental
health, 50 per cent football and
should be fun. It’s called Sober, not
Sombre.” In its second half, the audi-
ence can ask him anything about the
game. They won’t find his answers
boring.
The best player he played with?
“Emmanuel Petit,” he says. Really?
“He could play anywhere. We called
him The Horse and his goal against
Brazil in the 1998 World Cup final
summed him up. Manu could play left
back, left centre half, midfield. He
could actually play as a No 10. The guy
was awesome. If you’ve got a five-a-
side team, you want him. He made me
look good.”
Okay. Arsène Wenger and Sir Alex
Ferguson: how do they compare to
today’s best coaches? “It’s really inter-
esting. Alex was solid, with a system of
play, built three great teams and was
very good at assistants — like Steve
McClaren and Carlos Queiroz, who
were the Peps and Klopps of their day.
Alex was a manager, like a director of
football, who oversaw everything.
“Arsène kept things very simple.
His team-talks were short. Offence,
defence, set plays, go and play.
Because we had great players — and it
always comes back to the players.
“People think, ‘What are you talk-
ing about Tony?’, but it’s true. George
Graham, in some ways, was very
offensive. With him it was a full press.
I was up to the halfway line, a very
high line, and our front two was our
first press and I used to scream from
the back, ‘press, press, press, press’.
“When Arsène came, the first
pre-season we had up in Scotland he
said, ‘Tone, I want you to drop off a
bit. We’re going to counterattack. We
had very quick forwards — Marc Over-
mars and Nicolas Anelka — a link man
in Dennis [Bergkamp] and people
who could carry the ball distances in
Ray Parlour and Manu and Patrick
[Vieira]. We practiced winning the
ball in our own defensive third or mid-
field and counterattacking. In some
ways we were quite defensive under
Arsène and offensive with George.”
Adams bumped into Paul Scholes
recently and reminisced about the
great Arsenal-United rivalry of their
era. He met Ferguson and told him
that the year United won the treble
(1998-99), Arsenal should have won
the double. “Aye, but the year you did
the double [1997-98] we should have
done the treble,” Ferguson replied.
Adams believes Arsenal’s 2001-02
double-winning side were possibly
better than the 2003-04 Invincibles —
but that Graham’s 1990-91 title-win-
ners were better than both. “We lost
one game and I was in prison,” he
says. “I say to people, ‘I was invincible
in 91’. That squad was incredible.”
He tells a funny story about Wenger
trying to ban offsides in training
games. “I walked off in Switzerland at
a training camp. I said, ‘No that’s not
for me’. I got so angry. I was newly
recovering and didn’t have the booze
to suppress my feelings.
“Why was I angry? It made me look
silly, and I don’t like looking silly. It
was great for the forwards, there were
people all round the place scoring
goals and the score was 10-10. That’s
not my game. I want to keep a clean
sheet here and I want to have offsides.
I’m not having forwards stand behind
me. That’s schoolboy stuff.”‘We lost one game
and I was in prison. I
say to people, ‘I was
invincible in 91’. That
squad was incredible’Klopp has won it all at Anfield but
he won’t feel love like this again –
signing new deal was a no-brainer
You can calm down or lift your
spirits by watching videos of people
folding fluffy towels or popping
bubble wrap, or go one step further
and watch endless loops of Jürgen
Klopp punching the air in front of
the Kop to orchestrate the fans’
cheers after a victory.
Imagine having that connection,
that power, that amount of
goodwill towards you. Usually, the
Liverpool manager delivers three
fist pumps but now and again, he
becomes carried away. Where else
would the German enjoy such a
rapport? Probably nowhere, and so
he has signed a new contract to
remain at Anfield until 2026.
The timing of this deal is
extraordinary. It came a matter of
minutes after I had suggested to my
children that should Liverpool win
the Quadruple, it would be
impossible for Klopp to keep going
another day — let alone until his
previous deal expired in 2024. How
could anyone achieve the near
impossible, then start all over
again? He would be given leeway to
win fewer trophies and be lauded
even if he won none, but the sense
of a compelling trajectory would be
gone. Even if he were to replicate
the season, outsiders would begin
to resent his dominance.
The business model at Anfield
does not care so much about
silverware as it does about brand
development, and Klopp’s success
and popularity has attracted new
fans in far-flung places and left old
fans ever more enraptured. The
board would have been worried,
perhaps panicked, when Klopp said
last month that he would be ready
for a break in two years’ time.
There is a dream tucked away in theAlyson Rudd
‘Shankly spent
14 years at Anfield
but, after retiring,
he then regretted
his decision’At long last, Klopp has taken the
domestic cups seriously and found
that success in them helps more
than it hinders progress in the
league and in Europe.
It all makes you wonder how he
will cope when no longer in charge.
He is the Premier League’s longest-
serving manager and, right now,
nobody is bored by him. There was
a time when Arsène Wenger
professed his love for Arsenal, only
for many of the club’s supporters to
turn on a stale regime that lasted a
remarkable 22 years. Bill Shankly
spent 14 years at Anfield and
thought that was probably enough
but, after retiring, regretted his
decision. A friend of my dad’s once
bumped into the Scot not long after
he’d left the club and was nervous
about striking up a conversation in
case he was weary of strangers
approaching him, but it turned out
that Shankly was grateful to be
relevant and my dad’s friend was
unable to stop him reminiscing.
Perhaps Ulla, Klopp’s wife,
understands that her partner
would be lost without Liverpool. He
said her desire to stay on
Merseyside beyond 2024 was part
of the reason for his U-turn. He was
romantically involved with
Borussia Dortmund before he fell
for Liverpool, but that relationship
grew sour towards the end, and he
grew tetchy. There is room for more
growth in England at a club that
excels at recruitment.
Maybe it is too difficult to seal the
Quadruple but the owners have
averted the only potential
downside of it being achieved.
Klopp will not be ambling off for a
sabbatical, no matter how well
deserved, any time soon.It is interesting that current Burnley
caretaker manager Mike Jackson is
being portrayed in the media as a
managerial rookie. In fact, he
served as assistant manager and
manager at Shrewsbury in League
One and Tranmere in League Two
for years. Comparing his total
managerial win percentage at those
two clubs (15 per cent ) to that in his
first three games at Burnley (66 per
cent) could lead one to concludethat managing in the Premier
League is a doddle compared to
managing in the lower leagues!
Allan Higginson, Market
HarboroughAs a Man City fan for 60 years I
found myself nodding vigorously in
agreement with Graeme Souness’s
observation that Jack Grealish was
an unnecessary purchase and the
money ought to have been invested
in a striker. And, for all the four goals
against Real Madrid on Tuesday, it’s
hard to escape the conclusion that
the semi-final would now be safely
in the bag with better finishing.
Paul Johnson, via emailDavid Walsh’s article about the
recent history of managerial failure
at Manchester United overlooks one
thing: the rot had set in well before
Alex Ferguson retired, and he has
been given a very easy time over it.
Anyone remember Rafael?
Anderson? Macheda? United were a
fading force, and Ferguson resorted
to recalling retired or semi-retiredplayers approaching or having
reached the age of 40, such as Paul
Scholes and Ryan Giggs. David
Moyes arrived to find an outdated,
broken recruitment system.
Ferguson’s achievements are rightly
lauded, but he lost his touch
towards the end and left his
successors with problems which
have yet to be addressed.
Martyn Beardsley, NottinghamI was saddened and disappointed
by Rod Liddle's comments about
Manchester United supporters
(April 24) which were mean and
frankly ridiculous. I am, of course,
biased — being one of the
supposed “cry- babies” with a
“shrubbery” IQ.
I was in agreement with Rod’s
comments regarding the
unpleasant vitriol being heaped on
Harry Maguire, that is until his
spiteful final two paragraphs. Get
out more, Rod, and try speaking
with more than one or two
Manchester United supporters.
Ann Barnes, GlossopLETTERS
TO THE
EDITOR
Send your letters to:
The Sports Editor,
The Sunday Times,
1 London Bridge St
London, SE1 9GF
email: sportletters
@sunday-times.co.ukON TV TODAY
West Ham United v Arsenal
Sky Sports Main Event, 4.30pmRACE FOR
FOURTH PLACE- ARSENAL P33PTS^60
TodayWest Ham (a)
May 8Leeds Utd (h)
May 12Tottenham (a)
May 16Newcastle (a)
May 22Everton (h) - TOTTENHAM P33PTS 58
TodayLeicester (h)
May 7Liverpool (a)
May 12Arsenal (h)
May 15Burnley (h)
May 22Norwich (a) - MAN. UTD P35PTS 55
TomorrowBrentford (h)
May 7Brighton (a)
May 22C Palace (a)
6 Tottenham’s game against
Arsenal on May 12 is looking like
the key fixture. The Gunners have
not won in the league at their
North London rivals since 2014
(five defeats and two draws)