Dortmund
All major signings come with an element of risk. Will they settle in a new country? Adapt well to the pace of the game here? Or to their new clubs tactical framework? For some players, the risk is an even greater one. Their name is Christian. Liverpool’s problem with the name ‘Christian’ began back in […]
With football’s ever-growing obsession with the word “potential”, it’s not often one gets to make statements of absolution. Indeed, football is obsessed with making resolute, consummate statements within a game that is transient and is cursed with never really knowing what is real and what is just, essentially, an educated guess. Football clubs have the […]
A manager requires perpetual change if he’s to succeed in the savage land that is the Premier League. That’s the narrative that gets swung about on the regular, amidst pundits and fans alike. In Pep Guardiola’s first season, his tactical ministrations were seen as too imposing, not giving English Football’s top tier its due. Jose […]
Liverpool refuse to do things the easy way. 5-2 up in a Champions League semi-final ahead of the second leg, Jürgen Klopp would surely have been less restless had his side already confirmed a top four place, but alas the looming figure that is the tie in Rome seemed to provide enough distraction for Stoke […]
The year is 2016, the date April 14th. Liverpool welcomed hordes of Dortmund fans as they flooded the city. The Germans had finally landed on English soil. It is the second leg of the Europa League Quarter-final, with Liverpool managing the all-important away goal in a 1-1 draw at the Westfalenstadion the week previous. The […]
Ah, the word “passion.” Somewhat overused in the day and age of exposition, Liverpool Football Club has something of a connection to the idea of pure, unadulterated passion in the vast landscape that is football. Everything is magnified tenfold, because of its relation to everything else in the football sphere. So, when people marry the […]
We have all heard of, or seen on TV, the electrifying atmosphere in Bundesliga stadiums. A sight rarely witnessed in football anywhere in the world. The Bundesliga is breaking attendance records each year – well over 40,000 on average at each game – this season so far that number is over 44,000. More than 1,000 […]
Liverpool’s current league position and recent Champions League performance emphasise the fine job that Jurgen Klopp is doing. Things are not perfect, they indeed rarely are in football. However, despite the squad still being a work in progress, the year on year improvement is undeniable. A large part of Liverpool’s success this season is down […]
At 1-1, Dortmund’s recent failures stared them in the face. Julian Nagelsmann – the manager they’ve been pursuing as a means of ailing all their woes suffered under previous incumbents – was about to grind out a great result at the Signal Iduna Park. Hoffenheim had taken a first-half lead but the lack of attacking […]
In my previous pieces, you can also read part 1 and part 2, I discussed the challenges facing Jurgen Klopp, or indeed any Liverpool manager, in landing the league title. Namely, the issue of finances and the sensible “restrictions” FSG pose on spending money; also, the issues that Klopp’s tactical approach has had in overcoming […]
