Jürgen Klopp is ready to spend in the summer on up to six players to strengthen the Liverpool squad, even if competing with Chelsea and the Manchester clubs for transfer targets is likely to mean paying out more than ever before.
Liverpool broke even on transfers last summer and did not take the opportunity to reinforce significantly in January, though Klopp denies he is being kept to a tight budget by the club’s American owners. “The club have never said to me that a certain figure is too expensive; that has not happened yet and I don’t expect it to happen,” the Liverpool manager said. “We all have the same plan, the sporting director, scouting department, owners, myself – we all want to make this club as successful as possible so we will spend money in the summer. Of course we have to improve the squad, that is clear.”
Klopp feels there was not too much wrong with the performance against Tottenham in Liverpool’s last home match, though he is at a loss to explain why the intensity that so impressed Mauricio Pochettino had disappeared by the time his side arrived at Leicester last Monday. Whereas Liverpool at their best are a match for anyone in England – they have yet to lose to top six opponents – their best has not always been on display and compared with other leading sides their squad beyond the regular first team is thin.
“We could have done with one or two players in January, when we had injury problems and the Africa Cup, but the transfer window didn’t give us any opportunity,” Klopp said. “We will be prepared for the summer window, for sure. We are working on it already – we might need between two and six players.”
While that sounds a lot, Liverpool supporters will be more concerned about the calibre than the volume of incoming players. Without Champions League status –and qualification for next season is still in the balance – Liverpool in recent years have found it hard to compete with London and Manchester for top level transfer targets such as Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Diego Costa, Leroy Sané and Alexis Sánchez.
“We need to make the right transfers,” Klopp said. “It is not about money – we can go for the players we want – but at the very top level you might be competing with Barcelona or someone. Some players would rather live in London or Manchester instead of Liverpool, so we have to make a decision and try and make it happen. It might not be possible to break even again; that just happened last season, it was not a target. There will be a few new faces in summer, that is how it is always.”
Liverpool were so insipid in losing 3-1 at Leicester that Klopp was obliged to defend his players over suggestions they were physically intimidated and could not cope with the directness of their opponents. This is normally territory for Arsène Wenger, though Klopp found it easy enough to reject the idea that picking up only three bookings for foul play in the five games they have lost this season reflected a lack of commitment or aggression on Liverpool’s behalf.
“We are always pretty fair in the way we play – we want to win the ball not break a leg,” he argued. “In my opinion giving away fouls is not the same as being physical anyway. Being physical to me means being ready to hurt yourself, not the other player. The reason we lost at Leicester was because too many of our players were not at the right level.
“We had watched the Manchester City game [Leicester won 4-2 in December, the last convincing performance under Claudio Ranieri], we knew what to expect, but in the end it didn’t matter. We didn’t perform well enough to win at Leicester, that’s the truth.”