Jurgen Klopp will shed tears with Red Bull taste over Liverpool

Never in his wildest dreams could Arne Sloth imagine such a scenario.

His Liverpool team, eight points clear at the top of the Premier League table, are licking their lips at the prospect of next meeting with a struggling Manchester City side.

If the Reds win, they will have an 11-point lead, a margin that would allow for at least three defeats in the second half of the campaign.

Slot should know that Anfield has rarely been a place where Pep Guardiola’s side have thrived, even during periods when they have been firing on all cylinders.

And this season’s version was a pale imitation of previous teams witnessed at the Etihad Stadium.

During his tenure there were few instances where the Manchester City manager tried to lower expectations. But when asked about the prospect of defeat to the Reds, the Catalan admitted the gap was too big to repair.

“Yes (an 11-point difference would be too big to overturn) in terms of Liverpool winning, winning, winning,” Guardiola said after his side lost 0-4 to Tottenham Hotspur .

“We need to think about the next game, not the end of the season. In the past we won because we deserved it, now we need to improve step by step and, above all, qualify for the Champions League.” “

Slott, as you’d expect from someone facing a difficult passing game in his first season, is trying to control expectations. The fact of the matter is that only twice in Premier League history has a team that won 10 of its first 12 games failed to win the title, but any manager worth his salt knows that fate tends to linger on such omens.

“We know what we need to put in to get this league and these wins,” Slot told the media after beating Southampton 2-3 the day after City’s collapse.

“There were one or two games that were won by a big margin, but the rest were all narrow. We know how difficult it is to win a game and these players have been in the Premier League longer than I have.”

“I think last year (2022-23), even at the end of the season, Arsenal were leading by eight points and City came back.

“You know, if you meet Arsenal, City, Chelsea, Tottenham will also be great (beating City 4-0), they are all capable of winning so many games in a row. It’s nice to have that attitude, but we’re definitely not getting carried away.”

Slot was right to point out that Liverpool’s margin of victory is much smaller than this series suggests. The win over Southampton was a clear demonstration that victory is never a foregone conclusion, even against so-called relegation candidates.

“We dominated the whole game and it’s not that easy. You might be thinking, “Ah, we’re wearing number 20, that’s what we expect.” But I’ve seen a lot of Southampton games where they dominated. If you’re 2-1 down after the hour, you’ll probably be over the moon if you win 3-2,” added Slot.

But Liverpool’s ability to finish these close games gives Reds fans confidence. Most promisingly, Slote’s control of the team sets his regime apart from the high-risk, high-reward tactics of his predecessor Jurgen Klopp.

As the former boss looked on from his position as head of Red Bull’s global football division, the German coach could be forgiven for crying out tears of disappointment and regret.

Why now?

It must have been painful for Klopp that Manchester City’s seemingly indestructible machine decided to fail so soon after he decided to leave the Premier League.

Twice Liverpool’s North West rivals beat him to the title with a single point in what was the highest quality rivalry in the history of the competition.

What separated them on both occasions was that the clubs finished with over 90 points, a feat they had also managed individually in the campaigns that brought the title.

Due to the intense nature of these one-point title battles, a draw was seen as a hammer blow to the club’s title title.

This makes it even more absurd that City would go out and lose three Premier League games in a row this season.

And for this we must allow Klopp his tears and suffering. Predicting the Mancunian’s recent demise requires a level of insight that even an experienced manager like Jurgen Klopp would struggle to possess.

However, there is another factor that he might regret more: tactics.

Slot has remained virtually unchanged at Liverpool this season; only one minor player arrived to join the ranks.

However, the need to constantly press and force opponents into mistakes has been replaced by a Guardiola-esque emphasis on keeping the ball.

As a result, Liverpool will no longer have to sweat as much for their wins or manage to throw them away. This has made a difference in tight matches or even games like away to Arsenal when the team is fighting for control.

We’re left to wonder what Klopp is thinking as he watches from his role (perhaps given his footballing philosophy) in the world’s preeminent energy drink-turned-sports empire.

During his time in charge, Klopp’s side could have a couple of ice-cold Red Bulls at half-time to replenish their energy reserves for further gegenpressing.

According to Slott’s control-based philosophy, the only people who will be jittery from the caffeine after a game will be Klopp and his team at RB headquarters, who, as you can imagine, have access to a fridge stocked with shiny silver and blue cans.