His career at Porto was a very gradual one as he slowly made his way up the rankings in age groups or how senior the teams were that he managed. He started off still working with Rui Gomes while managing the Porto U19s team. Some of the layer who were brought up through this academy by Lijnders are: Diogo Dalot, Ruben Neves, Andre Gomes, Andre Silva and Joao Felix.
Pep’s penultimate season working alongside Gomes will have proven to be their most successful one as they managed to take the Porto U19s side to domestic glory and then managed to go on and win the FIFA Youth Cup. This competition is ran with all the champions of 10 leagues in Europe play against each other almost like the FIFA Club World Cup. This was a big achievement for this side as just days after winning the Portuguese Championship in their age category, Os Dragões headed to Switzerland to take part in the Blue Stars/FIFA Youth Cup – and duly won the trophy.
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As mentioned, Porto wanted to see more of Lijnders so he started to go up the rankings, so much that he only spent one season with the Porto B team (2012/13) and was moved up to be the first team Technical Coach for the 2013/14 season. It wasn’t too long before a big team came in and swept him away.At the same time as Pep was on the management team for Porto in the Portuguese first division, something way bigger was going on in the English first division. Liverpool’s 2013/14 title challenge – and we all know how that ended up. With Rodgers still as the helm of Liverpool Football Club and after all the disappointment of the season before, a new face was about to arrive on the shores of Merseyside.After 7 seasons at the Portuguese giants, Pepijn Lijnders stint came to an end with an offer from the reds to become the Head Coach of Liverpool’s U18s side. Pep Lijnders took this offer and joined Liverpool on August the 13th 2014. Rodgers would only continue to be in the top job at Liverpool for a few months after Pep joined with the German genius Jurgen Klopp taking control of things at Anfield after a fateful mistake by Rodgers away at the Bernabeu.
With Jurgen paying attention to Pep’s vision with the U18s and his attacking style of play, within one season Lijnders was on Klopp’s team and working alongside him as the first-team development coach. Pep joined Klopp’s team on July the 1st 2015 after managing to get the U18s team finishing in a comfortable position of 7th. Both of their visions on football are similar with counter attacking football being at the forefront of their games so they are very applicable to each other, a match made in heaven some might say.When Klopp was asked in an interview about Pep Lijnders he described him as the “mind to remember the things what we did in previous sessions” and that “he is our connecting point to the present and the future, so that’s really, really important.”. And when Lijnders was asked about Jurgen he said that “he is the motivator, the stimulator behind every forward step we make”. Lijnders formed a good relationship with Georginio Wijnaldum because of their Dutch roots.
Even with Lijnders working on the first team he was still helping youngster’s make their way up from the U18s to the first team. He did this by setting up a system in which youngster’s get the opportunity to train with the first team and impress Jurgen. These training sessions are key in the emergence of Rhian Brewster, Harry Wilson, Ben Woodburn and, most of all, Trent Alexander-Arnold.These sessions would entail Pep Lijnders giving them a training session with the first team with a high intensity, so when it comes to these players breaking out into the first team, they are more prepared for the training sessions. This group was known as the “talent” group and they were fast tracked to these sessions which really has come off well for players like Trent Alexander-Arnold.Lijnders had spent 2 and a half years on Klopp’s team at Anfield when an offer came in from Dutch Second Division side Nijmegen Eendracht Combinatie (NEC for short) for Lijnders to be head coach. And on the 2nd of January 2018 Pep Lijnders left Merseyside to return to his home country for the first time in his career since 2007.Pep’s job when he arrived to NEC was to get them in a promotion play-off position in order to get them into the Eredivisie in the next season. Pep did manage to get them into this position but failed to get them into to First Division of Dutch football after failing to defeat Dutch side Emmen. Losing 4-0 away then going to the second leg at home and putting 4 past them only to concede an away goal and send NEC crashing out of the Promotion Play-Off’s and destroying their Eredivisie hopes.
Pep and Jurgen Klopp see eye to eye with how football should be played, with the Liverpool boss opting for a “gegenpressing” tactic and Lijnders opting for a similar style of counter attacking football. When asked in an interview about how his years at Porto changed his managing style he said “I never changed the essence – high-intensity, attacking football – I changed my way of thinking about [it], and especially the way to train it”.After his failure at NEC and with the Assistant Manager position at Liverpool being up for grabs after Buvac had left just before the second-leg against Roma, the idea of a return to Merseyside looked very much on the cards. Liverpool had also just experienced one of their most successful seasons in Europe for many years getting to the final of the European Cup with Klopp declaring that he will “bring it back to Liverpool”. The timing was all too perfect for Pep to make his return to English football.Surely enough, Pep Lijnders officially returned to Liverpool FC on June the 30th 2018, a day before Fabinho was announced, and was put as Jurgen Klopp’s assistant manager. Their deadly partnership worked brilliantly, he’s Klopp’s Dec to his Ant, his Barry to his Paul and most of all his Paisley to his Shankly.Who knows what the future contains for Pepijn Lijnders, another head coach job? Will he continue to Jurgen’s assistant? Will he be Jurgen’s successor, like Paisley? One’s thing for certain, Pep Lijnders has the potential to become one of the best manager’s and at his age this could certainly happen.Article by Ben Taylor – @bensgtaylor
