Jurgen Klopp Last Words At Anfield

On how he feels about what he experienced due to the fact it is ‘not normal’ for a manager to receive such a send-off when leaving a club…

No, I don’t think it’s normal. I knew for a long time already that our relationship was pretty special, I love that. I think that the people made a difference for this club. As I said, these people are the superpower of this club, these people keep the club going, these people push the club, and these people carry the club through difficult moments. These people are the club. So, we had a really good time together, nine years, nearly a decade. It was absolutely crazy. Kids who today were in the stadium, kids of the staff who were today in the stadium and I saw after the game, they don’t know another manager of Liverpool FC. That’s how it is – they just think I was always there and will always be there and now I’m gone.

I expected… I was a bit afraid of a breakdown. I had one or two moments during the week where it was not great and during the game the last few minutes were tricky, but the general feeling today was it felt more like a start than an end because I know the goodbye is about me but in general it is about the team and I saw a wonderful team and I saw a wonderful team on the way. I saw a team that was ahead of schedule in their development. It’s a tough league and you never know where you start again but I saw just a good football team, and I saw all the young players who saved our backside a couple of times this year and none of them besides Conor [Bradley] and Jarell – Jarell played and Conor was on the bench and the others were all not involved today. They are there as well and that’s what gave me the feeling of, ‘OK, job done.’

I love you all, I love all and everything about the club but it’s time for me to go. But look, it’s not burning behind me and that gives me a good feeling. It’s not that you think, ‘Come on, get out of here!’ So, I know I can come back and I will come back and how I said after the game, from today, from three hours ago when the game finished, I’m a Liverpool supporter and I love that.

On how the last week has impacted him…

Everything impacted me. It was fantastic. As I said, the boys showed class. It’s difficult to deal with these kind of things. I could not use the exit of the AXA Training Centre, I could not go out there, I would still stand there and sign autographs. The people show me so much love, and that’s fine. You cannot come to my house and stuff like this. It’s really difficult to take. It’s so positive and I wish it would be for somebody else and I would be his best friend. That would be great – my best friend gets all this attention. But I get all the attention, that’s really tricky to take, to be honest. I just try to get through this and there will be a moment when nobody asks me anymore, nobody looks at me anymore and I just go down for a few hours or days, I don’t know, we will see that. But for the moment I have to function and I have to keep going and do that.

But today it was wonderful. I want to thank everybody. I love how we said goodbye to the staff, and how the players said goodbye to the staff. For the public, it’s Jürgen Klopp, Jürgen Klopp, Jürgen Klopp, Jürgen Klopp. But Jürgen Klopp is Pep Lijnders, Jürgen Klopp is Peter Krawietz, Jürgen Klopp is Vitor Matos, Jürgen Klopp is John Achterberg, Jack Robinson, [Claudio] Taffarel, Jürgen Klopp is Andreas Kornmayer, Andreas Schlumberger. Jürgen Klopp is so much more than Jürgen Klopp. I alone would have done absolutely nothing. It’s really nice how the people did that today because everybody felt really appreciated. I don’t have a lack of appreciation, obviously, everybody shows me in the first moments and tells me they will miss me. I’m happy that all the other guys got their attention as well.

It was an incredible time. I love it. My family was on the pitch, which was nice, really nice. Now we will have a party and then we will come back next for another event. And I will come back occasionally just, as I said, as a supporter now, and I’m fine with that, honestly. Maybe not for the first game of the season – that’s early, wow! Maybe after the second international break or something like that. What can I say? There must be a difference if the things go bad, always worse, worse, worse or if the things go well and go. I’m really happy that we could have done it like that – that we did it that way. Third, that’s alright.

On what he’ll do on his first day not being Liverpool manager…

I have no clue. Packing probably, I think so but I don’t know. I have enough things to do. [A] private life must be planned and I didn’t plan anything yet because I was here. Probably Ulla will update me on where we go and stuff like that but I follow happily. But I have no clue what’s coming. I know we have a party tonight – that’s what I know.

In the future…

I don’t know exactly why nobody believes I probably will not be a manager again, but I understand because it seems to be a drug, looks like everybody comes back and everyone works until they are 70-something. I always had the idea that I would not do that long. Look, other people are smarter, other people can do it in different ways. I have to be all-in, I have to be the spark, I have to be the energy, I have to be all these kinds of things and I’m empty. That’s it. My biggest worry today was John Achterberg was coughing all the time next to me and I thought I would wake up tomorrow morning and be ill because he was coughing in my direction. I have to start with the rest now and then we will see. But it’s not now that I feel now already and [think about] maybe the next opportunity. You only have to look outside which clubs are available and stuff like that. There will be opportunities but I don’t sit here and think, ‘Maybe in a year I take that.’ At this moment, see you later.