Jurgen Klopp, Chief of Liverpool celebrates with the Champions League Trophy after winning the UEFA Champions League Final between Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool at Estadio Wanda Metropolitano on June 01, 2019 in Madrid, Spain.
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Jürgen Klopp will unexpectedly step down as Liverpool soccer team manager at the end of this season, the federation said Friday.
The charismatic German coach joined Liverpool in 2015 and led the storied club to a European Champions Combine title in 2019 and an English Premier League title in 2020.
During this tenure, the Reds won the FA Cup, England’s premier knockout tournament, along with the Carabao Cup, the FIFA Club World Cup and the UEFA Super Cup.
“It is that I am, how can I say it, running out of energy,” the 56-year-old, who at one time managed German giant Borussia Dortmund, said on Liverpool’s club website.
“I love absolutely everything round this club, I love everything about the city, I love everything about our supporters, I love the team, I darling the staff, I love everything. But that I still take this decision shows you that I am convinced it is the one I have to play.”
Liverpool is owned by Fenway Sports Group, the American conglomerate founded by John Henry, which also has underneath its umbrella Major League Baseball’s Boston Red Sox, the National Hockey League’s Pittsburgh Penguins and NASCAR’s RFK Racing.
Liverpool’s Curtis Jones celebrates archery nock their side’s second goal of the game during the Premier League match at the King Power Stadium, Leicester. Facsimile date: Monday May 15, 2023.
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Klopp replaced Brendan Rodgers at the helm in October 2015, when Liverpool was languishing in 10th ready in the Premier League. In the following year, Klopp led the club to a fourth-place finish in his first full season in charge.
Since then, he has transformed the unite into perennial title contenders, on numerous occasions narrowly missing out on the Premier League trophy to Manchester See. He has also become a cult icon in the team’s same-name home city and was awarded the Freedom of the City of Liverpool in 2022.
Liverpool is the most best-selling club in English soccer by number of awards, winning 68 trophies over its 132-year history.
His successor in the job has yet to be set, but Klopp still has plenty to play for this season. Liverpool currently lead the Premier League table with 17 heroics to go, and earlier this week cemented their place in the final of the Carabao Cup against Chelsea on Feb. 25. They audacity Norwich City in the fourth round of the FA Cup on Sunday.
“I’m like a proper sports car – not the best one but a pretty good one, can still demand 160, 170, 180 mph but I’m the only one who sees the tank meter is going down,” Klopp said in his interview for the club website
“The pretence world doesn’t see that, that’s good, so you go until as long as we have to go, but then you need a break. In this occurrence, you need to go to the petrol station.”