Elmar Neveling - Jurgen Klopp

CONTENTS

About the Book

ABOUT THE BOOK

It is the intensity of the football, of how the people live football in Liverpool, all the Liverpool fans around the world. It is not a normal club, it is a special club. Jurgen Klopp

As innovative as Arsene Wenger and as crowd-pleasing as Jose Mourinho, Jurgen Klopp is the charismatic German manager who single-handedly overthrew the accepted order in German football taking Borussia Dortmund from nowhere to back-to-back Bundesliga titles and the Champions League final. He had long been admired in the Premiership and was finally wooed by Liverpool in the belief he can bring back the glory days to the Kop.

Klopp is revered as a master tactician with his own unique playing philosophies like counter pressing and spatial geometry. He is loved by his players for his passion and man-management skills, and adored by the media and fans alike for his disarming wit and charm and exciting football on the pitch. Success and rebuilding may take time and patience; in the meantime here is the definitive story of Jurgen Klopp the normal one and his footballing genius.

Elmar Neveling writes for DFB Bundesliga magazine, Spiegel online and newspaper Ruhr Nachrichten . He is the co-author of the football tactics book The Anatomy of the Modern Game , a graduate in business administration and is currently writing a doctoral thesis on sport economics.

DORTMUND EUPHORIA: KLOPP TRIUMPHANT

Dortmund, 15 May 2011. A city in the mood for celebration. The main B1 road, usually jammed with cars, is closed to traffic and lined with crowds instead. In total an estimated 400,000 fans have turned out to watch the open-topped bus parade through the city to mark Borussia Dortmunds seventh German championship.

It is a parade that begins at Borsigplatz in the north of the city where, at the Zum Wildschtz tavern in 1909, the club was founded. A song has been written to commemorate these roots, and the tune captures the mood of the parade. Rubbeldikatz, rubbeldikatz, rubbeldikatz am Borsigplatz! The words might be unusual rub the cat in Borsigplatz but the tune, written by club legend Alfred Aki Schmidt and the band Casino Express, is infectious. It feels like its got the entire city on its feet. Even when it starts to rain, nothing can dampen the mood.

On the team bus, joining in the mass singing, is Dorutmunds charismatic manager, Jrgen Klopp. Having slept only a couple of hours, Klopp hides his tired eyes behind mirrored aviators. His croaky voice betrays the hearty celebrations of the previous night, but his enthusiasm is undimmed. Klopp, who during his playing career only ever experienced the Bundesliga as a spectator, is manager of the German champions.

Standing next to Klopp, microphone in hand, is Dortmunds stadium announcer Norbert Dickel, the Hero of Berlin from their 1989 DFB Cup triumph (the German equivalent of the FA Cup). Does Klopp have a quick greeting to the fans, already waiting for their hero in front of the Westfalenhallen, where the parade will culminate? This is just the warm up, Klopp promises. Well be right there, then were going to have some fun. But first, we have to practise penalties! As he does so, he holds aloft a handwritten sign that was handed to him, recommending exactly that. During a season of remarkable success, there had been one strange statistical anomaly: Dortmund had been awarded five penalties and missed every one of them.

Such was the volume of fans lining the streets, it took hours for the team bus to arrive in front of the Westfalenhallen. One by one, the players took to the improvised stage and received the tumultuous applause of the supporters. As Klopp took to the stage, a song specially dedicated to him by the singer Baron von Borsig blasted over the tannoy: Kloppo, du Popstar. Klopps vocal cords were strained by the effort of talking over the noise: Youll have to be a bit quieter, he told the cheering fans, my voice isnt so good right now. Theres a good reason for that. Unbelievable, unbelievable day, an unbelievable fortnight [since Dortmund were declared champions]. Then he joined in the fans chant: Theres one and only champion of Germany, BVB, BVB! (BVB is short for the full name of the club: Ballspielverein Borussia 09 e.V. Dortmund.) When Bayern Munich won the title in 2010, Louis van Gaal called himself a Feierbiest a party monster. In Jrgen Klopp, he had a worthy successor.

* * *

The contrast with the clubs position a few years earlier could not have been starker. In 2002, Dortmund was a city still used to success: Champions League and Intercontinental Cup victories in 1997, Bundesliga champions in 1995 and 1996, UEFA Cup finals in 1993 and 2002. It seemed inevitable that the trophy cabinet in the Westfalenstadion would grow ever fuller. But then the club had flung money at sporting success and things had got out of hand. BVB had teetered on the brink of bankruptcy not just in intensive care, but being readied for the autopsy, to quote one report. A complete meltdown was averted at the last minute, but the sporting development of the team was crippled as a result. The club had been saved because the creditors agreed to a rescue package, but the budget cuts left the team a shadow of its former self in the following seasons.

The sporting architect of the success story was Jrgen Klopp. Within three years, he had transformed an average, mid-table team into national champions. A charismatic and meticulous coach, he was described by Dortmunds sporting director as my best transfer. The comparison with the previous Dortmund title-winning team was stark: while the champions of 2002 were a side filled with experience and international stars such as Tom Rosick, Jan Koller and Amoroso, Klopps BVB was youthful and dynamic, boasting home-grown stars like Mario Gtze and Kevin Grosskreutz. When he arrived in Dortmund, Klopp had promised full throttle football and he had kept his word.

The last time Dortmund had been champions in 2002, there had also been joyous celebrations in the city. But the 2011 vintage was something different. These were scenes that werent planned, werent expected and that no one had even dared hope for. There was an emotional bond between the players and the fans that hadnt been there before: an enormous wave of enthusiasm that reached far beyond the Ruhr metropolis itself. Klopps Dortmund was a young team that had given everything in every game a commitment to the cause that a whole nation could identify with. It would probably be fair to say that in 2011, the city of Dortmund cheered for its heroes more enthusiastically than ever before.

The triumph of Klopp and his team gave the city a reinvigorated sense of pride and self-respect. Dortmunders define themselves through the success of their football club in a way that only the other inhabitants of the industrial or post-industrial Ruhr understand. This is a city that has struggled with high levels of unemployment 13 per cent at the time of the 2011 Bundesliga success and which makes sporting success for the city all the more meaningful.

Klopp was well aware of the responsibility that put on his shoulders. Asked about his motivation early in his time as manager, he said, What we can do is give people a distraction, make people happy. [] I cant do anything to improve the political circumstances, I cant change anything about the social reality but we can give these people a moment of happiness. This attitude is why so many of the fans loved Klopp. And why, with Borussia Dortmund, Jrgen Klopp found his second sporting love after Mainz 05.

Some of the Dortmund fans took their love of their manager further than others. In Spring 2011, die-hard BVB fan Martin Hschen had a portrait of a shouting Klopp tattooed onto his back. Such was his faith in Klopps managerial ability, he then added a second tattoo of the Bundesliga trophy, even before the title had been confirmed. The finished artwork covered the entire upper half of his back.