Happy Birthday Jurgen Klopp!

Happy Birthday Jurgen Klopp! Until Gerard Houllier’s arrival at the club, Liverpool FC had never had a manager born outside of the British isles. In the intervening 17 years the Frenchman and his Spanish successor Rafa Benitez both delivered unexpected European success and once Jurgen Klopp was appointed, fans were hoping for more of the same and maybe a little bit more. Jurgen started his career off like a lot of other successful managers, as a player. He spent his entire career at FSV Mainz before taking up the managing role there as his first step into management. He went on to become their longest-serving manager and his most notable achievement was getting the club out of Bundesliga 2 and into the top flight of German football for the first time in their history. For their three year stay in the Bundesliga they managed to keep themselves involved in the league but that came to an end and when Klopp couldn’t get them back up into the top flight he resigned as manager. He was not out of a job for long though as Borussia Dortmund came calling in May 2008. His appointment immediately paid dividends as the team won the DFL Super cup and went from 13^th position to 6^th in the league. The following season Dortmund position went up to fifth but it was the 2010/11 season that got both the team and manager noticed. BVB won their first league title in nine years, being crowned champions with two games to spare and the next season Dortmund did it again this time with a German record breaking tally of 81 points and managed to string together a 28 game unbeaten run. They also beat rivals Bayern Munich 5-2 in the DFB Pokal to earn their first domestic double in their history. In 2012/13 they managed to reach the Champions League final where they would face Bayern but it was Munich who came out on top this time. Jurgen Klopp became manager of Liverpool in October 2015 after Brendan Rodgers was sacked due to a poor start to the season. In his first season he managed to lead the Reds to two finals, one being against Manchester City in the Capital One Cup and the other being a Europa League final against Sevilla, unfortunately we lost both of those. Fast forward to 2018 and Klopp had gotten the team to Kyiv where they would play Real Madrid in the Champions League final, it was tough game but unfortunately the team walked away with losers’ medals. Klopp changed a lot of Liverpool fans from doubters to believers since joining in 2015 and Reds fans will be hoping next season we can finally grab some much deserved silverware. Article by Lauren Black – @Lauren_Black9 For more Redmen TV content including podcasts, subscriber exclusives and three new shows every week subscribe now and get your first month for FREE bit.ly/RMTVjoin