Arsene Wenger
Jurgen Klopp has reiterated his strong opposition to plans of restructuring football’s global calendar. And the Liverpool manager has once more given an impassioned plea for the game’s governing bodies to scale back the amount of competitive action for fear of burnout for football’s brightest stars. Earlier this week, Real Madrid goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois hit out at the amount of fixtures being foisted upon players at the elite level, slamming UEFA for only being interested in “extra money for a game on TV” after a Nations League third-place playoff between Belgium and Italy. However, Arsene Wenger, who is now FIFA’s chief of global football development, has been lobbying for a World Cup every two years and claimed this week that “the big competitions are something that everyone wants to play in.” Klopp aired his criticism of the plans last month after meeting with Wenger at Liverpool’s AXA Training Centre and the Reds boss has again launched a stern critique of the various plans to add more fixtures to an already jam-packed schedule.
Jurgen Klopp said: “With internationals, of course, the problem is the [domestic] manager is not exactly the right person [to take the issue forward] because there are few managers who work a long time at a club in England. When you are longer in the job, (Manchester City boss) Pep Guardiola mentioned the five subs issue again for the Carabao Cup because it is the right thing to do. We are the only country who can only make three substitutes. Whatever we say, you all accept it. No-one is worried about it, you just take it. We cannot pick the subjects we want to have a say in, but in the sports part, we are not all involved. So when you come to a new club, let’s say Watford, how can [a manager] think about more general problems other than saving their own lives in a hot seat? That’s difficult. It’s just difficult. There are a few managers out there who have an opinion, they mention it, but nothing changes.”
Klopp was speaking after confirming that both Fabinho and Alisson Becker will fly straight to Madrid ahead of Tuesday’s Champions League clash with Atletico after being named in the Brazil squad for their game with Uruguay 35 hours before Saturday’s visit to Watford. Liverpool initially tried to move the game back to try and get the Seleção duo in the squad for the visit to Vicarage Road, but will now send both to the Spanish capital to avoid quarantine issues in the UK.
Jurgen Klopp added: “FIFA came here, showed me plans for the World Cup every two years, I told them what I thought, I didn’t like it. UEFA came here and showed me the new Champions League format, I didn’t like it. Nothing changed. When UEFA didn’t tell anyone about the Nations League games, I read somewhere that England have four Nations League games this summer because we have no summer tournament. So the players have no holiday again and then play a World Cup in November. We all know about this, we are in it, but nobody speaks about it. We make maybe one little article about it with what I say, but the pressure on these people needs to come from somewhere else, they are not interested in my opinion. My opinion is not based on my interests. It’s based on the needs in this game, that is it. We will get through it but in the long term, we have to change it because you cannot do it. The situation is already difficult to deal with for the players but if they all get their ideas through with more Champions League games and World Cups more often and more often there will be more Euros too because no-one ever steps aside. England, whenever we discuss it, they have two cup competitions. There’s an extra game for the [Carabao Cup] semi-finals. They say ‘oh no, we need this’ and it never goes in any direction. That is frustrating because we talk about it but nothing changes.”
Jurgen Klopp continued: “These problems, you know it as well as I do, so you write the article because you have to fight as well to show you care, because if you don’t then don’t ask me, because I don’t want to talk to people who don’t care and it’s just for information. My opinion has been clear for six years and you know that already that I am not fine with some things. But I am still here, I still love what I do with circumstances, against the circumstances, for the club, all these kinds of things. That is all fine. Is that right? No.”
