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Former Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers opens up about 'draining' last days at Anfield

The Northern Irishman remains proud of coming close to the 'holy grail' at Liverpool

Mark Critchley
Northern Football Correspondent
Monday 04 September 2017 13:05 BST
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Brendan Rodgers was dismissed from his post at Anfield in October 2015
Brendan Rodgers was dismissed from his post at Anfield in October 2015

Brendan Rodgers has revealed how ‘draining’ he found the Liverpool job during his final months on Merseyside.

Rodgers was dismissed from his post at Anfield in October 2015 despite coming close to ending the club’s long wait for a league title a year earlier.

The Northern Irishman, now at helm of Celtic, led Liverpool to the brink of the title during the 2013/14 season, only to eventually finish runners-up to Manuel Pellegrini’s Manchester City.

After losing the talismanic Luis Suarez to Barcelona the following summer, Rodgers’ side could only manage a lowly sixth-place finish and he was then sacked after a poor start to the 2015/16 campaign.

While speaking at a charity dinner in Belfast on Saturday, Rodgers admitted that he was exhausted by the end of his spell at Anfield and was glad to subsequently take a seven-month break away from football.

“When I came out of Liverpool I needed a break. It was so intense. It was draining. We moved to London just to come away from it,” Rodgers said at the dinner, held in aid of Northern Ireland Hospice.

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“I had offers from England and a couple from China, where the money is very good, and that's tempting for a boy from Northern Ireland. But I had come out of one of the biggest institutions in the world and I had to find that pressure again.

“I've got that now. With Liverpool you can go away from home and draw and that's OK. But Celtic, you have to win every game. It's a different pressure.”

On his near miss with Liverpool in 2014, which almost saw the club win its first league title since 1990, Rodgers described his side’s challenge as ‘special’.

“I came as close as anyone there to the holy grail of winning the league. That season, with the fans, it was special.”

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