As Liverpool manager, Jurgen Klopp didn't like long meetings. Rather than sit and ponder his latest big decision, he regularly had important conversations over lunch in the practice cafeteria.
Klopp was never a formal man, but Mike Gordon – head of Liverpool owners Fenway Sports Group – worked with the kind of casual confidence often associated with dot-com entrepreneurs. – placed Germans on the same level as corporations. leader. According to Mr. Gordon, he was, as he told Raphael Honigstein in his book “Bring the Noise,'' “the kind of person you would choose to run your own company.''
Klopp's new role as Red Bull's global head of football, which he takes up early next year, could take on such comprehensive responsibilities. As Red Bull explained in a statement, he is not involved in the day-to-day running of the five clubs the company owns, sponsors or has a minority stake in, but he supports the sporting director, scouting department and coaches and is responsible for Red Bull's It will ensure activity. Philosophy” runs through each of their interests.
The decision, taken suddenly nine years and one day after arriving at Liverpool, may at first glance be surprising given Klopp's exhausted appearance when he left Anfield in May. . At the time, he said he was depleted of energy and needed to take a complete break from football management.
Jurgen Klopp is given a guard of honor after his final match against Liverpool (Clive Brunskill/Getty Images)
He left Borussia Dortmund at the end of the 2014-15 season with a similar message, landing on Merseyside shortly after a summer spent primarily playing tennis.
Klopp has found it difficult to sit still for long periods of time, but his new job at Red Bull will encourage a slower, less stressful return to the game he loves, and perhaps that's why he will play in Germany. This will bode well for a job with the national team. He is a long-coveted player, with domestic reports suggesting there is an exit clause in his contract.
Gordon's comments about Klopp's abilities were made in 2017, and his powers have increased in the years since as Liverpool have become increasingly successful. As a result, the support network that had contributed to Liverpool's success was dismantled. Although Klopp was no longer running Liverpool, as the most important financial decisions were still made by Gordon, he was still the public face of the multinational company and the football department belonged to Gordon. This explains why Liverpool currently employ a head coach rather than a manager, with the club's sporting director leading strategic and staffing decisions. It would be good to hear if Klopp thinks taking on too much has led to burnout.
Perhaps the Red Bull gig gave him an opportunity to understand the world that interests him. Last year, there was talk that he would enroll in a sports director's course, but his agent neither confirmed nor denied it. Unlike at Liverpool, he will be able to do his job without the pressure of preparing for the team, playing matches, attending press conferences, etc. In an Instagram post on Tuesday, he said the treadmill has prevented him from learning as much as he would like. If he were to take charge of Germany in the future, he would have a deeper understanding of the responsibilities that come with different leadership positions.
Klopp is not the first former Liverpool manager to win this particular title with Red Bull. In 2012, after Gerard Houllier was forced to retire due to declining health, he met the company's founder, Dietrich Mateschitz, who showed up at a conference in Austria wearing jeans and riding a motorbike.
How influential Houllier was was determined by the impressions of the people he spoke to. He later claimed to have played a leading role in the organization's attempts to bring Sadio Mane from Metz into the organization in 2012, but those close to the organization said his responsibility was that of the ambassador. This suggests that it was close to. Hold hands with your partner and sometimes whisper advice.
Is Klopp's remit as comprehensive as it seems? The Red Bull brand has been in need of some semblance of legitimacy since they started investing in football in 2005, and he certainly comes in handy.
By the time Houllier became involved with Liverpool, it had been eight years since he left the club, and the Red Bull group had yet to produce a squad talented enough to qualify for the group stages of the Champions League. The Leipzig club have since reached that round in seven of the past eight seasons, but the story of teams making it through the regional divisions has not always been well-received in Germany, where the rules are lopsided. Favors for fan representation and large outside investments are treated with suspicion.
Dortmund fans protest before the match against RB Leipzig in 2017 (TF-Images/TF-Images via Getty Images)
At Dortmund and Liverpool, Klopp exploited the credibility of each club's faithful, sometimes usurping artificial elements from rivals and elsewhere. If he was Dortmund's manager in 2016 when they faced newly promoted RB Leipzig in the Bundesliga for the first time, it would have been interesting to hear his thoughts on the actions of Dortmund supporters who boycotted the match in protest of their opponents. Dew. 'Ownership model.
“Dortmund is making money, but we are making money to play football,” Jan-Henrik Grzecki, one of the protest organizers, told the Guardian newspaper. “But Leipzig is playing football to sell a product and a lifestyle. That's the difference.”
So Klopp may have tarnished his reputation by partnering with a soda company that is the exact opposite of what he once represented. Perhaps this will depend on how visible he is during his time at Red Bull, especially in Germany.
Klopp will be removed from day-to-day coaching at Red Bull (Alexander Hassenstein/Getty Images)
Back in England, the company holds a minority stake in Leeds United and has taken over the club's shirt sponsorship. Oliver Mintzlaff said in May: “Our ambition to return Leeds United to the Premier League and establish ourselves as the best football league in the world fits very well with Red Bull.” Mintzlaff, Red Bull's CEO of corporate projects, played a key role in Klopp's appointment.
In the same month, upon leaving Liverpool, Klopp hinted that he would never manage another Premier League club. But it's not too hard to imagine Leeds returning to the top flight soon, if that happens, and as expected Red Bull will provide technical support, but if Klopp remains in the position. It will be interesting to see where he fits in. Will he end up helping, even in a small way, in the plot of Liverpool's collapse on match day?
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Many are quick to believe that one of his first jobs will include sacking Red Bull Salzburg's former assistant at Liverpool, Pep Lijnders, who lost back-to-back games to Brest and Sturm Graz last week. There was a commotion as I heard voices asking if I was going to die.
There are no plans to sack the Dutch manager, but Klopp won't officially start at Red Bull until January. Reinders has been tasked with leading training sessions and given their closeness at Liverpool, it seems unthinkable for Klopp to suggest changes if asked. If anything, Klopp's arrival at the Red Bull stable has definitely increased his chances of survival.
For the time being, Klopp has been relieved of the heavy lifting of day-to-day management, and the role allows him to strike a neat balance between new challenges and engagement with the elite, without the pressure and scrutiny that comes with being a manager. It seems like he's taking it. . It remains to be seen whether Klopp can resist the latter topic in the long term.
(Top photo: Getty Images)
