Jürgen Klopp

[Phoenix07]

Is it really the role of the Sporting Director to get involved with the coaching aspect of things, either by making his opinions known or foisting a coach onto the Manager's staff?

If he's responsible for the footballing strategy aspects, then he should be involved in ensuring all operations related to the football team are working well. He wouldn't be appointing or signing anyone, whether that be players or coaches, without the manager's agreement, but he should be able to ask questions on our fitness, or player's form, and ask the question whether adjustments can be made. For example, if it was this season, they'd be able to look into the sudden drop off of many of our players, and determine if it's due to our intensity over the years, or too much prep in the summer, meaning we're burnt out. That'd lead to discussions over whether it means we need to replace a lot of players, and/or tweaks can be made to training to handle that. It's a fresh voice to offer a fresh perspective.

[baitman]

If he's responsible for the footballing strategy aspects, then he should be involved in ensuring all operations related to the football team are working well. He wouldn't be appointing or signing anyone, whether that be players or coaches, without the manager's agreement, but he should be able to ask questions on our fitness, or player's form, and ask the question whether adjustments can be made. For example, if it was this season, they'd be able to look into the sudden drop off of many of our players, and determine if it's due to our intensity over the years, or too much prep in the summer, meaning we're burnt out. That'd lead to discussions over whether it means we need to replace a lot of players, and/or tweaks can be made to training to handle that. It's a fresh voice to offer a fresh perspective.

Rafa in

[BootRoom]

If he's responsible for the footballing strategy aspects, then he should be involved in ensuring all operations related to the football team are working well. He wouldn't be appointing or signing anyone, whether that be players or coaches, without the manager's agreement, but he should be able to ask questions on our fitness, or player's form, and ask the question whether adjustments can be made. For example, if it was this season, they'd be able to look into the sudden drop off of many of our players, and determine if it's due to our intensity over the years, or too much prep in the summer, meaning we're burnt out. That'd lead to discussions over whether it means we need to replace a lot of players, and/or tweaks can be made to training to handle that. It's a fresh voice to offer a fresh perspective.

I'm all for the Manager being held to account for the decisions he's made; I just don't agree with the idea of the Sporting Director sticking his oar in over low level stuff like formations and coaching, as has been suggested.

[swishtz]

Rafa in

[Rich]

I wonder whether we need to look at our shape and tactics for next season. Our 4-3-3 is so reliant on exceptional talent and blend of the front three - catching lightening in a bottle stuff.

Plus having marauding fullbacks as assist machines.
Plus having legs and more legs in midfield.

Can we find the players to make the system work again?

[Doc_Piptorious]

I wonder whether we need to look at our shape and tactics for next season. Our 4-3-3 is so reliant on exceptional talent and blend of the front three - catching lightening in a bottle stuff.

Plus having marauding fullbacks as assist machines.
Plus having legs and more legs in midfield.

Can we find the players to make the system work again?

I think any team that wants to compete at the top tier for a sustained period will be reliant on having exceptional talent making up a % of the starting XI.


With how a large number of our players have been playing this season I think any formation would hit it's ceiling at a level that would not satisfy us.

I personally think that there were spells this season where going five at the back might have made us harder to score against, but that might have turned losses into draws and the odd draw into a win rather than seeing us power up the table quickly.

Regardless of formation we need legs in the team as obvious as that is to say and as cliched as it may sound to some. For me it is not a cliche though as a look at our average distance covered per game this season compared to some other recent seasons shows we are not covering the same ground, not making the same amount of sprints, not making the same number of pressures and so on.

Even more of a concern is when you look at our numbers of things like the above in relation to other teams. A hell of a lot of teams are out running us, having greater numbers of pressure poer game and so on.

We have gone from being the super stamina run other teams into the ground team to being one that is really average in terms of our physical qualities and abilities and what is really worrying is that when individual stats are looked at for distance covered, sprints per game, pressure per game etc., it is some of our younger players that have fallen off the cliff.

We have simply lost the ability to go toe to toe with other teams physically.

Now whether that is all down to players getting old or down to a mix of players getting old and some of the younger players not being there mentally is a matter of personal conjecture.


From the outside looking in it does appear like we have a lot of players content to coast to the end of the season, and a lack of players looking to meet the rough period we are in head on. A lot of the "leaders" in the team seem to be the ones whose heads are dropping and that appears, opinion of course, to be setting the tone and bar for others.

[Phoenix07]

Even more of a concern is when you look at our numbers of things like the above in relation to other teams. A hell of a lot of teams are out running us, having greater numbers of pressure poer game and so on.

We have gone from being the super stamina run other teams into the ground team to being one that is really average in terms of our physical qualities and abilities and what is really worrying is that when individual stats are looked at for distance covered, sprints per game, pressure per game etc., it is some of our younger players that have fallen off the cliff.

We have simply lost the ability to go toe to toe with other teams physically.

Now whether that is all down to players getting old or down to a mix of players getting old and some of the younger players not being there mentally is a matter of personal conjecture.

That's one of my major concerns. It's not just the older players who've lost that ability, but the youngish ones too. Is that down to pre-season prep? Accumulation of fatigue over a number of years? I fear we'll sign Bellingham and Mount, and then four years later, we'll have burnt them out too. I'm probably exaggerating here, but I just don't know. It's not a few players who look cooked, but pretty much all of them. Trent is the big one for me. He's 24, and looks gassed.

I'm really hoping most of our issues stem from a horrific cock-up of our last pre-season, pushing them too much after the gruelling quadruple chase.

[Tribute]

That's one of my major concerns. It's not just the older players who've lost that ability, but the youngish ones too. Is that down to pre-season prep? Accumulation of fatigue over a number of years? I fear we'll sign Bellingham and Mount, and then four years later, we'll have burnt them out too. I'm probably exaggerating here, but I just don't know. It's not a few players who look cooked, but pretty much all of them. Trent is the big one for me. He's 24, and looks gassed.

I'm really hoping most of our issues stem from a horrific cock-up of our last pre-season, pushing them too much after the gruelling quadruple chase.

...whatever the reasons for our massively obvious burnout, I hope we know what's caused it and can fix it in summer. If we start slowly, under-paced and with a relaxed attitude next season, Klopp won't make Christmas.

[Exiled_red]

I wonder whether we need to look at our shape and tactics for next season. Our 4-3-3 is so reliant on exceptional talent and blend of the front three - catching lightening in a bottle stuff.

Plus having marauding fullbacks as assist machines.
Plus having legs and more legs in midfield.

Can we find the players to make the system work again?

Our league and CL winning sides were based on the midfield working hard and offering not much creativity or goal threat going forward, that bit was essentially left to the forwards with their pace and linkup play and the fullbacks getting forward.

Since then we have been trying to get more attacking threat from the midfield, if we are to do that there needs to be a trade off somewhere else, either the fullbacks don't get forward as much or the forwards have more defensive responsibility. I think for the past couple of years we have tried to have it all, last year it nearly worked, this year it feels like we are paying the price we run the players particularly the midfielders into the ground with ageing legs or injuries in a number of cases and exhaustion in others we haven't been at it and it's doubtful many of these players we be able to get back to those levels (the older ones in particular).

The options are to either change the system completely or go back to the midfield that works it's balls off and does little else, maybe if we can get some great players we can do a little more than that, but those players are few and far between perhaps Bellingham is one (if we can get him), but you would still probably need two hard working No 6's alongside him, you would also need players who could rotate into those roles and backup for the fullbacks as they can't keep doing what they have been doing forever.

[Doc_Piptorious]

That's one of my major concerns. It's not just the older players who've lost that ability, but the youngish ones too. Is that down to pre-season prep? Accumulation of fatigue over a number of years? I fear we'll sign Bellingham and Mount, and then four years later, we'll have burnt them out too. I'm probably exaggerating here, but I just don't know. It's not a few players who look cooked, but pretty much all of them. Trent is the big one for me. He's 24, and looks gassed.

I'm really hoping most of our issues stem from a horrific cock-up of our last pre-season, pushing them too much after the gruelling quadruple chase.

On one hand we can point to playing a lot of games, to pre season, to the world cup and so on and say it had a mental and physical strain.

Then you go and look at the older players at other big clubs that also play a lot of games season after season and they seem to be picking up steam as the season wears on.

A lot of those players had long hard seasons the past two or three seasons, they had the world cup and pre seasons. They all have a congested season this season.

It looks more and more like it is something very specific to us rather than a general malaise. I said very early on in the season that a lot of our players looked undercooked at the start of the season rather than fatigued and I still think that.

That we tried something new within our training set up. Could be different routines, different diets, changing the build to full fitness process or whatever, but we looked badly undercooked imo and went into a season that way, and then by the time we might have been shaking that out and starting to build to being "cooked" (note I am not saying back to showing form) the season then halted for the world cup.

Other teams then saw their up to speed players ( form and fitness) go to the world cup, we saw our still getting up to speed players then have their process broken.

world cup ends. The players at other clubs then come back a bit fatigued but with the build from a proper preseason and proper build to fitness buffering that somewhat so they lost less ground physically due to the world cup.

Our guys came back from the world cup at a lower level as they had not, imo again of course, reached a peak level prior to the world cup, so we were starting from a lower base post world cup than we should have been.

Now all of that is on Klopp and his back room teams as if there were changes put in place in terms of training, recovery processes, diets and so on, then that is their remit, and it may well be a gamble that backfired in spectacular fashion this season.

On the pitch however things like self motivation, attitude, desire, responsibility and so on is on the players. They are all seasoned pros, especially all the guys who did not join this season, and they needed to be trying to force things on the pitch as much as possible too in order to try and counter set backs


Again all that comes with a big dollop of imo

[Phoenix07]

On one hand we can point to playing a lot of games, to pre season, to the world cup and so on and say it had a mental and physical strain.

Then you go and look at the older players at other big clubs that also play a lot of games season after season and they seem to be picking up steam as the season wears on.

A lot of those players had long hard seasons the past two or three seasons, they had the world cup and pre seasons. They all have a congested season this season.

It looks more and more like it is something very specific to us rather than a general malaise. I said very early on in the season that a lot of our players looked undercooked at the start of the season rather than fatigued and I still think that.

That we tried something new within our training set up. Could be different routines, different diets, changing the build to full fitness process or whatever, but we looked badly undercooked imo and went into a season that way, and then by the time we might have been shaking that out and starting to build to being "cooked" (note I am not saying back to showing form) the season then halted for the world cup.

Other teams then saw their up to speed players ( form and fitness) go to the world cup, we saw our still getting up to speed players then have their process broken.

world cup ends. The players at other clubs then come back a bit fatigued but with the build from a proper preseason and proper build to fitness buffering that somewhat so they lost less ground physically due to the world cup.

Our guys came back from the world cup at a lower level as they had not, imo again of course, reached a peak level prior to the world cup, so we were starting from a lower base post world cup than we should have been.

Now all of that is on Klopp and his back room teams as if there were changes put in place in terms of training, recovery processes, diets and so on, then that is their remit, and it may well be a gamble that backfired in spectacular fashion this season.

On the pitch however things like self motivation, attitude, desire, responsibility and so on is on the players. They are all seasoned pros, especially all the guys who did not join this season, and they needed to be trying to force things on the pitch as much as possible too in order to try and counter set backs


Again all that comes with a big dollop of imo

Whatever they tried to do to compensate for the World Cup hasn't worked at all. I'm hoping that's all it is, because, as you say, other players have played a lot of games for years, and aren't suffering in the same way. It does seem specific to us. I think even our injuries this year are miles ahead of any other club according to a graphic.

[Doc_Piptorious]

Whatever they tried to do to compensate for the World Cup hasn't worked at all. I'm hoping that's all it is, because, as you say, other players have played a lot of games for years, and aren't suffering in the same way. It does seem specific to us. I think even our injuries this year are miles ahead of any other club according to a graphic.

Our injuries I think are down to the change in the recovery and analytics system we started using. Not many clubs use the same system but those that did/do ended up with an unusually amount of injuries the season of the change or the season after.

If I had to make a semi educated guess with regards to the system, the creators of the system have added elements from other sporting disciplines in an attempt to get ahead of the rest and it simply has not adapted well to footballers.

[Angryred]

Our injuries I think are down to the change in the recovery and analytics system we started using. Not many clubs use the same system but those that did/do ended up with an unusually amount of injuries the season of the change or the season after.

If I had to make a semi educated guess with regards to the system, the creators of the system have added elements from other sporting disciplines in an attempt to get ahead of the rest and it simply has not adapted well to footballers.

Hope they got their asses kicked!

[BG1973]

For all the credit that klopp has in the bank my worry is him stubbornly sticking to "his style" when we don't have the legs to make it work consistently.

I worry that he is surrounded by too many arse kissing yes men who don't make a better case for a more pragmatic approach and allow us to sit back and defend more solidly and then be better able to hit teams on the counter.

When we are defending a corner we are often at our most dangerous and can break really quickly and cut teams open.

Frustrating watch this season but changing the style to deal with a short term problem maybe counter productive in the longer run.

Although Klopp himself has alluded to getting back to basics from time to time so what do...any of us know.

Time will tell, starting with the approach to recruitment this summer.


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[Mark79]

Sounds like Klopp has gotten feisty with members of the press again in the embargoed press conference

[ame]https://twitter.com/monkeysponge/status/1646856600953540608[/ame]