Jurgen Klopp will bring a spirit commensurate with Liverpool's sporting values

Jürgen Klopp’s status as a football purist should serve Liverpool well.

And so he goes.

There was a dull sense of inevitability to Brendan Rodgers’ sacking after a 1-1 draw in the Merseyside Derby on 4 October. There was no shock, no disbelief and no emotion –save for a sense of relief at what had essentially been euthanasia. The jig was up and had been for a long time.

The decision, apparently made ahead of the game at Goodison Park and with full intention to be honoured regardless of the outcome, comes perhaps a touch too late, made, as it was, only after Liverpool’s voluminous additions to the playing staff and the backroom team during the off season.

For that, Liverpool’s owners, Fenway Sports Group, must be faulted for a poor sense of timing. They waited too late to attack the ball, and it has taken a thick edge. It is arrowing towards the slip cordon, and Liverpool can only hope that the manager’s seat is filled swiftly and purposefully enough to ensure the ball falls short of the man at third slip.

Brendan Rodgers’ sacking comes after a little over three years at the job. Three roller coaster years that saw the club come as close as they have ever come in the past quarter of a century to recapturing the league title that, at one point, must have seemed their personal property. Three years that have also seen Liverpool come undone in soul destroying fashion despite heavy spending throughout that interval.

Rodgers at the end of three years – positive and negative in equal measure

Brendan Rodgers made some positive contributions to the club, but it was the right time for him to go.

Ultimately, these three years must be viewed as entirely Brendan Rodgers’ doing, and also as a failure. It was Rodgers’ who introduced the fast, pressing style of attacking football that reinjected life into what had been a largely dour Anfield atmosphere. It is he who must be awarded at least partial credit (if not the greatest percentage thereof) for bringing out the ‘unstoppable’ in Luis Suarez, and for maximising the effectiveness of players (such as Jon Flanagan and Jordan Henderson) that clubs such as Manchester City and Chelsea would not have looked twice at. And it is he who ought to be blamed for a persistent inability to organise a competent defence, for tactical naivety and for a mystifying aversion to adapt to a changing environment in time.

‘Survival of the fittest’ was postulated several years ago, but never has it sounded more pertinent than in the case of Brendan Rodgers’ time at Liverpool. He could not adapt, and therefore, did not endure.

It appears as though Fate feels particularly impish when distributing opportunities to Liverpool managers in the Premier League era. You each get one chance to gun for the league title, says Fate. If you do it, then congratulations. If you don’t, then that’s the door over there. Let the next man have a shot.

There will always come one season where the squad is the best it will ever be, where one direct rival or another will conveniently falter, where Liverpool and their supporters will have the growing belief on New Year’s Day that the title is, finally, within reach. For Roy Evans, it was 1996/97, for Gerard Houllier it was 2001/02, for Rafael Benitez it was 2008/09 and for Brendan Rodgers it was 2013/14. They all fell agonisingly short, unable to negotiate a different hurdle that came with each chase.

With his dismissal, Brendan Rodgers becomes the first Liverpool manager (discounting Roy Hodgson, because he never completed the season) since Phil Taylor – Phil Taylor! – to vacate his post without winning a single trophy. The fact that he came closest (closer than any of his predecessors since 1992) to the biggest one of them all only adds to the crushing disappointment felt at the end of a reign that had, at one point, promised so much.

But accusing Fate smacks of excuse-mongering. It also serves no purpose, now that Brendan Rodgers is history and the tantalising Jürgen Klopp is supposedly close to being named the new Liverpool manager.

The Cinderella syndrome

Klopp has the potential to resolve Liverpool’s lingering identity crisis.

For all the issues with Fenway’s ouster of Rodgers at this juncture of the season, they should also be awarded their due for the swift capture of Klopp as a replacement if and when it eventually happens. Because this is the proverbial match made in heaven.

To understand why this would be a hand-in-glove fit, it is essential to understand the awkward stumble the Liverpool board have encountered across the great divide of the old First Division and the Premier League. This identity crisis has caused a fatal indecisiveness that has compromised Liverpool’s ruthlessness in crunch situations

There is no room for sentiment in the snake pit of top level professional football, but Liverpool’s reluctance to act forcefully at key moments is a worrying reminder of their position on some perceived moral high ground. A moral high ground that, unfortunately, brings underachievement far more often than it does success. Chelsea, tellingly, have had no such qualms, and their pre-eminence over the past decade is testimony to the efficacy of that particular strategy, no matter how seemingly abhorrent.

What Liverpool have needed is a figure to energise a collection of individuals floating aimlessly, higher than the greatest percentage of teams in the Premier League, but frustratingly below the ones at the sharp end on which Liverpool have their own designs, and a boardroom faced with a clash of ideologies in a positive direction. Jürgen Klopp is very likely the man who can resolve the issue of disconnect and bridge the gap between Liverpool’s more intangible, sentimental side and the fast-paced, results-driven nature of modern football – and do justice to both.

Liverpool’s best football in the past five years inevitably came during the 2013/14 season. At times, it felt like it was 1988 again, with Liverpool’s ferocity and bravado absolutely breathtaking at times as they utterly demolished team after team in a campaign that has been immortalised in written word, even though Liverpool have nothing to show for it. There was an intensity, an excitement that bubbled frothily ahead of every kickoff that speaks of the ethos of a club that has had multiple pretensions to the league title but has been outed as exactly that each time – pretenders.

Jürgen Klopp understands this – more than any manager since Roy Evans (Kenny Dalglish’s was, after all, a return). Seven years of schooling amongst the similarly passionate and earthy support (who also share the anthem “You’ll Never Walk Alone”, lest there be any doubt) that pay faithful pilgrimage to the Signal Iduna Park have left their mark on Klopp.

He is an atypical sort for someone who has managed so successfully at the top level. For Klopp’s emotional connection to the game and its long forgotten Corinthian values are not found in abundance in the high-pressure managerial positions in world football. Loyalty, honour, honesty...all these words can be used in conjunction with the former Borussia Dortmund boss without fear of recrimination.

A romantic – but also an intelligent manager

There is an incredible sense of romance that Klopp brings with him, a spontaneity and feeling that his predecessors (most notably Gerard Houllier, Rafa Benitez and Roy Hodgson) were none too keen to put on display. Beyond the dewey-eyed praise, however, it is sometimes easy to forget the intelligence and sophistication of his football.

On paper, it appears a perfect fit. Liverpool’s 2013/14 campaign was built around a lightning quick attack, constant pressing and piercing directness. Klopp’s immensely successful Borussia Dortmund side trounced the mighty Bayern Munich in the league on two consecutive occasions (2011 and 2012), becoming one of the best sides in Europe in the process, and it was due to a powerful style of play.

The term used to describe this approach in Klopp’s neck of the woods is gegenpressing – a high pressing, relentless counter attacking game played with discipline and, of course, breakneck pace. The similarities are obvious, and although Dortmund were never quite able to earn that final European validation their dominance merited, ironically falling to Bayern Munich in the 2013 Champions League Final, it is probable the likes of Alberto Moreno and captain Jordan Henderson will enjoy themselves in this setup.

A misleading record?

Borussia Dortmund did not always have it hunky-dory under Klopp.

He appears a natural fit to restore the splendid attacking tradition at Liverpool, a club floundering like a fish out of water, looking beseechingly towards the German for inspiration, but is Klopp all he is made out to be?

Not even mentioning his relegation with FC Mainz at the beginning of his managerial career, his last season at Dortmund, for example, was objectively catastrophic (although the cup competitions strangely profitable) – multiple injuries and the cumulative pile up of the void left by the departures of Mario Goetze and Robert Lewandowski left the club hovering around the bottom of the table, their eventual 7th place finish obfuscating the horrors that had preceded it. Given that losing key players is a challenge he will likely have to grapple with on a regular basis at Liverpool, one wonders if Klopp can avoid a repeat performance.

Furthermore, the style of play that brought Dortmund so much success was also the cause of significant problems. The high-intensity approach of playing on the break made for a spectacle, but it took a heavy toll on the squad and was, no doubt, partly to explain for the fatigue and injuries that constantly dogged his players. It also exposed Dortmund’s lack of imagination at times; smashing Bayern Munich left and right was all well and good, but against a side that had the sole motive of parking the bus and escaping with a point, the approach was occasionally found lacking.

Nitpicking? Or genuine concern? Klopp’s impact on Liverpool cannot be judged right now (certainly when he has not yet formally taken charge), but it is unrealistic to expect him to be leading the league in spring. He is painfully human, as his struggles with Dortmund proved, and as fallible as you or I, so it is fair to remove the halo from his head during the official unveiling.

Jürgen Klopp may not be able to restore Liverpool to their former position at the top of English football’s food chain. But he brings an enthusiasm and excitement that hasn’t been properly imbibed by a Liverpool manager this side of 1 January 2009. And that’s a good thing.