Jürgen Klopp has likened Liverpool to Rocky Balboa on the basis they must work and compete harder than any of their rivals to win the Premier League title. The Liverpool manager believes the competition will intensify this season with Tottenham Hotspur emerging stronger for their inactivity in the transfer market.
Liverpool begin their campaign at home to West Ham United on Sunday amid high expectation having invested £170m in a squad that reached last season’s Champions League final. No club spent more on new players this summer than Liverpool, although as Klopp pointed out: “The last few years I have had to defend our transfer behaviour because we sold more than we brought in. There would always be a point where we spent a bit more money.”
Klopp shares the expectation upon his team before the new season but dismisses claims that Liverpool’s form last season, allied to this summer’s incomings, makes them favourite to challenge Manchester City for the title. “We are still Rocky Balboa, not Ivan Drago,” said the Liverpool manager, a big fan of the Rocky films, when describing his team’s prospects. The analogy was not that Liverpool are underdogs, he later explained, but that they must be prepared to sacrifice everything to end the club’s current 28-year wait for a 19th league championship.
“It’s not about being the underdog, not one little bit,” said Klopp. “I don’t want to be the underdog. I want to win, and Rocky won. Now [people say] we have the best tools of all? It’s not true. City were a fantastic team last year and they brought in [Riyad] Mahrez. Tottenham were a fantastic team and they also finished ahead of us. They didn’t bring in anybody but they are still a fantastic team who will develop.
“I said a few years ago about the Dortmund team of 2011 or 2012 that if somebody said to me then: ‘You can keep that team together for the next four years or you can get this and that player but you have to sell him and him …’ I would have said: ‘No, I’ll keep that team together.’ If it’s good, it’s good. Tottenham are not weaker than last year, they are just more experienced. Arsenal are a fantastic team so why should we now be the favourites? We didn’t do anything so far. You can not be kind of the number one if you didn’t win so far?
“Our potential is good. What we do with it, we will see. That’s only the quality we have. I only want from us that we fight, not that we are the underdog. I am not interested in being the underdog. Yes, it has happened a few times but not because I wanted to be, but because it was a fact. I don’t see us an underdog. I see us as a team that challenges, the ones who have to do more, who have to run more, who have to jump more. That’s all.”
Klopp will hand a Premier League debut to Brazil international Alisson, who was the world’s most expensive goalkeeper at £65m for less than a month until Chelsea signed Kepa Arrizabalaga for £71m on Thursday. “I didn’t think it would happen that quick,” said the Liverpool manager. “But it is a massive difference if you want a goalkeeper now.”
Liverpool’s new No 1 admits his aim is to not only justify the transfer fee but, similarly to Mohamed Salah following his £36.9m move from Roma last summer, to make it appear a bargain in time.
Alisson said: “It was a big deal for Roma, they had a record fee and they were happy, and I’ll work very hard to make sure it’s a good deal for Liverpool too, which is more important. I know that Salah was thought a good deal for Roma but now people say it is a good deal for Liverpool. I want to work hard to ensure that people say they paid a [bargain] price for me too, eventually. I want to ensure that it is a really good deal for Liverpool. That is my job and my aim now.”
