Gary C

A liverbird upon my chest # YNWA

[ᜰ @markklfc]

Jürgen Klopp on Liverpool appointing Andoni Iraola as their next manager:

🗣️ “I've seen some people questioning this appointment and honestly, I think they're making a huge mistake.

Liverpool haven't hired a manager because of his name. They've hired him because of his work. And in football, that should always be the most important thing.

When I watch Iraola's teams, I see courage. I see intensity. I see players who run like their lives depend on it. I see a team that refuses to be intimidated by anyone.

That sounds very familiar to me.

People forget that before managers become elite, they first have to be given the opportunity. Not everyone arrives with ten trophies and a global reputation.

What matters is whether you can coach. And believe me, this guy can coach.

I faced his teams and they were a nightmare. They pressed, they fought, they attacked and they never stopped believing. You leave those games exhausted.

The thing Liverpool supporters will love is that he doesn't play with fear. He doesn't care about budgets, reputations or big names. He wants to compete. Every single week.

And if he brings that mentality to Anfield, with better players and bigger resources, then the rest of the Premier League should be very worried.

Because Liverpool haven't appointed a caretaker. They haven't appointed a celebrity.

They've appointed a coach who is obsessed with improving, obsessed with competing and obsessed with winning.

And those are usually the most dangerous ones.”

[Stan Collymore @StanCollymore]

Mo Salah. A very long read.

I think I know a little about LFC, its supporters and how they view their club. Shaped of course by Shankly then Paisley, Kenny, Jurgen and now now Slot.

One thing remains constant, perhaps more than any other English club, its always the club first and last, players and managers add their DNA to the club, but the club trumps the individual.

Now, Mo Salah has left plenty of winners DNA at Anfield and has taken his place in the pantheon of greats.

So it's interesting to see his interview, dropping a grenade into the club because if I know Liverpool and it's supporters at all (I think there may be even a generational difference in responses, younger supporting the grenade, older shaking their heads) then their first reaction will be..

Club, first and last, don't care who it is. Its a living and breathing mantra and one that even Mo Salah will find it difficult to duke it out against.

Now, could Arne Slot be less pally with players than Jurgen? Absolutely, he's a calm, relaxed, tad detached guy who ( if you remember) was unimpressed with Trent early doors and showed a nonchalant attitude in season one to "one of their own" who'd won everything there is to win. I think that's impressive, but not as impressive as winning the title in your first season. So he's earned his respect too.

The team are playing well in spurts, comedy defending and decision making at other times. That includes everyone, and if you ask 99.9% of players if they'd accept 2 or 3 games on the bench for not hitting levels, all will say yes. Only in the madness of 2025 modern football would the cult of personalities not only question a reasonable conclusion of "you're not playing well, here's a spell on the bench", but Mo maybe has almost tricked himself onto elevating himself to the untouchable status of Messi or Ronaldo, players who could, if they chose, literally do and say as they pleased in the last decade. Mo isn't them, and Liverpool as I said, isn't that club either.

I'm sure some of the youngsters will rant "he's right and Slot's to blame ", but without any evidence that Slot has deliberately ( managers NEED their star players to perform, not to be asked about them in every presser for the next 5 months....) ostracised anyone at the club other than do what every good manager has done since the invention of the game, namely leave someone out who's not playing well misses the point as every great club, team and manager have dropped great players at some stage. Some even when playing well!!

The solution to what is now a very open sore is simple (ish)

1. Player and manager talk privately.
2. Manager tells player what he wants from the player.
3. Player commits or tells manager he wants out.
4. If player wants out, make it happen quickly. If not, pick the player and let him be judged by his continued performances. If they're poor, manager can't lose, "I told you so". If they're great, manager can't lose. So Slot playing Mo is a very good starting point, especially as 2 very big signings have yet to make Mo " yesterday's man"

Arne Slot can help himself a little by using his natural openness to say " maybe I'm not Jurgen but I love my players and they couldn't have won a spectacular title last season without reacting to me and my methods a little too, but I hear Mo's comments and I can tell you all now, I love him to bits and he's ours to keep". That heads off any "seniors" with similar grenades to throw.

But one thing's for sure, I don't think there will ever be a Liverpool player past, present or future with valid gripes that would jeopardise the "club first and last" ethos of Liverpool, and those who've had legitimate concerns I'm sure aired them at an appropriate time, not a flash interview when emotions are high.

Liverpool FC have done as well for every player who's played for them as players have done for the club, so the institution has earned that private, rather than public critique. Whoever that's from.

[Mark Goldbridge @markgoldbridge]

Got to say that's not enough to go down and shouldn't be given but just look who is VAR....

[Anfield Lounge @AnfieldLounge]

🚨🇧🇷 NEW: Liverpool are pursuing Real Madrid's Rodrygo to replace Luis Díaz.

The forward's representatives are in the UK for talks.

He is enthusiastic about the opportunity to join a top Premier League club.

[@Oliveira32Pablo]

[Boss Liverpool Goals @BossLFCgoals]

❤️🇵🇹

[Ste Hoare @stehoare]

I don’t care if he signs Frimpong, Kerkez, Wirtz, Isak, Alvarez, Yamal, Mbappe, Haaland & Rodri this summer, if Richard Hughes sells Federico Chiesa this summer, I’m storming the AXA.

It’s the best song we’ve had for years, can’t lose it now.

[LFC Transfer Room @LFCTransferRoom]

Erling Haaland watching the Liverpool game on the big screen while watching his own team play on a laptop.

But apparently “nobody cares about this Liverpool title”.

[🧎🏾 @Luchoresi]

🧏‍♂️

[Liverpool FC @LFC]

Mo is all of us right now 😍

[Red @TaintlessRed]

Jurgen Klopp winning a league Title against Man City's unlimited resources, and 130 charges of cheating, with biased refs like Coote gifting decisions to City and against Liverpool is amongst the biggest achievements of any manager in Premier League history.

[- @AnfieldRd96]

Man City apparently won the league yesterday and no one is bothered, which is exactly why I wanted them to win it 🤝

[- @AnfieldRd96]

Rival fans will never understand what Klopp has done for us, and I genuinely don’t care. Yes, we could’ve and should’ve won more but the things we did win, mean so much.

[Dan @Dan23_92]

At this point City aren’t just under an asterisk, they’re the equivalent of letting Ben Johnson run the 200m in Seoul after he’d already failed the drug test.

[𝗞𝗼𝗽𝘁𝗮𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗰𝗡𝗲𝗶𝗹 @KoptasticNeil]

Absolutely without doubt ROBBED ... Oliver and his cronies bottle jobbed it. Everyone knows it's a penalty ALL day long #LIVMCI #115

[barry @BackseatsmanLFC]

Should have won but a draw is fine. If we beat Brighton after the international break and City/Arsenal ends in a draw, we're in the same position as we were before this weekend but 2 games closer to the finish line.

[BBC Sport @BBCSport]

"It was 100% a penalty!"

Do you agree with Jurgen Klopp? 🤔

#BBCFootball #PL #LIVMCI

[Karl @KarlThyer]

#LFC denied a stonewall pen at home against both Arsenal & Man City. But yet the league has supposedly been rigged for us to win it. 😂

[Gary C @garyc375]

@piersmorgan I thought Martin Odegard would have been there taking photos

[barry @BackseatsmanLFC]

Klopp on the fist pumps:

"What the outside world thinks about it - I couldn’t give a shit to be honest. And you can write that exactly like that."

I am not prepared for the fact he won't be the manager in 4 months time 🥲