Liverpool supporters should be excited - Jurgen Klopp's Reds will play at full throttle

COMMENT: Liverpool’s new manager brings a high-octane pressing style that made him revered in his native Germany

(2015 Liverpool FC)

Jürgen Klopp looks different already. At his first press conference as Liverpool manager, Anfield’s latest hero looked a far cry from his rugged touchline persona in Dortmund. His hair was neatly combed, the shirt looked smart. Even the three-day stubble seemed to have had two days trimmed from it.

Klopp was wearing jeans, but England will have to get used to that. Managers in denim are commonplace in the Bundesliga, and it seems unlikely that a man of Klopp’s personality will kowtow to such an outdated British sensibility.

It is a forceful personality, and one which has made Klopp a cult figure far beyond the cities of Mainz and Dortmund. But, as his slightly more clean-cut appearance on Friday indicated, there is more to this man than his global image as a charming, emotional motivator.

The image is not entirely wrong. He is certainly charming, though the smile that was plastered to his face on Friday won’t always be there. The joking German has had his fair share of rants. After his side were beaten by Real Madrid in 2014, for example, he berated television presenter Jochen Dreyer for asking stupid questions, before cutting short his post-match interview.

Klopp is also a wonderful motivator. Though he admires the likes of Pep Guardiola and Jose Mourinho, his approach to management is much more intuitive, less scientific.

“My job is to coach a team and to worry about the game,” he is quoted as saying in a recent biography. “I don’t need cold, hard statistics to do that. I can recognise things on my own. If my team is taking too long to get the ball forward, I can see that long before I have the stat sheet in my hand.”

Klopp has described his style as “heavy-metal football” in the past, and on Friday he promised Liverpool fans that they would be seeing “full- throttle football”. Yet beneath the noise, the emotion and the intuition lies a lot more calculation than Klopp’s image betrays.

At Dortmund, Klopp put immense store on lactate tests in order to guide his training sessions. Each player would undergo a regular test so that Klopp was able to gauge just how hard he could work every individual in training. Given the intensity of his style of play, this nugget of science was invaluable in ensuring he did not exhaust his squad.

The much lauded gegenpressing style with which Dortmund won consecutive Bundesliga titles may have looked full wild and emotional, but it was in fact cold-blooded. Gegenpressing is based on hunting the ball down as soon as possession is lost. While it requires a lot of running, its effect is to minimise effort. By applying pressure immediately, the opposition never have time to find their shape on the ball. Klopp’s Dortmund worked like a predator, forcing their opponents into a corner before going for the throat with those exhilarating changes of pace.

Klopp on the pitch at Anfield (2015 Liverpool FC)

Klopp will be happy with the players he has inherited. James Milner and Emre Can press the ball well, and are technically suited to Klopp’s style. Daniel Sturridge and Christian Benteke both have a nose for positioning which will allow them to exploit the gaps left by gegenpressing.

The man who will excite Klopp the most is Jordan Henderson. Under Brendan Rodgers, Henderson arguably developed into Klopp’s dream player: a box-to-box midfield leader with relentless running and technical and tactical excellence. When he returns from injury, the Liverpool captain should thrive under his new boss.

The main concern, as ever with this Liverpool side, will come in defence. It may jar with Klopp’s promise of “full-throttle football”, but Liverpool fans will be happy to hear that he is serious about securing defensive stability.

“When I arrive at a new club, I know there will be problems, because otherwise the previous manager wouldn’t have gone,” Klopp once said. “The first thing to do is to make sure the group is strong defensively. That makes any team better straight away”.

The new manager’s personal skills may come to the fore, here. Dejan Lovren’s confidence must be restored, while Mamadou Sakho’s temperament must be moulded into a force for good, rather than a liability. If anyone can master those challenges, it is the world-famous motivator Jürgen Klopp.

If he can get the best out of the squad, there is little doubt that Klopp and Liverpool are the perfect match. Back in Germany, an adoring, romantic perception of the English game still endures, and Klopp is as much of a sucker for it as any of his compatriots.

His style, in fact, is loved in Germany for its perceived resemblance to the anarchic ideal of English football. The German weekly Die Zeit said this week that “Klopp’s Dortmund got to the Champions League Final in 2013 with an unpretentious, British style of play.”

Where better to take that style of play than Anfield? In an age where German stadiums are seen as having better atmospheres, Liverpool is one English club where the fans remain as passionate, as vocal, as their German counterparts. For all his subtleties, Klopp does indeed live the emotions and passions of football. He will fit right in.

Neven Subotic is a potential transfer target (Getty Images)

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WHOSE FACE WILL FIT?

Will succeed under Klopp

Jordan Henderson may well become the lynchpin when he returns next month. As captain, his calm leadership will draw comparisons with Sebastian Kehl, who captained Klopp’s Dortmund for most of his reign. He continues to add tactical nous to his stamina and obvious technical abilities.

Will not succeed under Klopp

Adam Lallana has not enjoyed the happiest spell of his career at Liverpool. If his problems with injury continue, he may find it difficult to break into a midfield Klopp will want to establish early in his tenure. Not all Klopp’s players need relentless pace, and the manager will appreciate Lallana’s intelligence. But he might struggle to find a role in a high-class midfield.

Who will Klopp buy first?

There has already been talk of Klopp bringing his former Dortmund charge Neven Subotic to Anfield. The manager needs to shore up the defence, and Subotic is no longer guaranteed a starting role at Dortmund. Otherwise, Klopp may want to add more pace to his midfield, and bring in a winger. Bayer Leverkusen’s Karim Bellarabi and Borussia Mönchengladbach’s Patrick Herrmann are the top two choices from Germany, but both extended their contracts earlier this year.