Jurgen Klopp reveals why he stares at the opposition during their pre-game warm up

GiveMeSport

·4 January 2024

Jurgen Klopp reveals why he stares at the opposition during their pre-game warm up

Jurgen Klopp has established himself as one of the best managers in the world over the past decade. The German has a history of revitalising some of the biggest clubs, having done so with both Borussia Dortmund and Liverpool, ending nine and 30 year waits for league titles respectively.

The 56-year-old is also an enigmatic figure, who doesn't let social norms stand in his way of being himself. Some of his personal highlights include running onto the pitch to celebrate a later derby winner against Everton. He wore some Cristiano Ronaldo boxers for a team meeting ahead of a Champions League final. He even parodied Rocky Balboa after winning the European Super Cup.

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One other strange thing Klopp does that fans have picked up on is that the former Mainz boss stares down his opponent during warm-ups. The German was recently caught doing it ahead of his sides Premier League game against Manchester United. This led to fans speculating about what the reason for this would be, with many suggesting that it is a technique to intimidate the opposition.

👀 Jurgen Klopp has his eyes fixed on the Manchester United players warming up
– Tuesday, 19 April 2022

It was former Manchester United goalkeeper Ben Foster who had a chance to speak with the Liverpool boss about this habit. The Premier League winning coach finally gave us an answer as to why he does it, and it has nothing to do with intimidation.

Why Klopp stares at his opponents during their warm-ups

The German looks to gain information ahead of the game

Speaking to Klopp on the Amazon Prime Video Sport YouTube channel, Foster told him that he had experienced first hand the impact that the German's presence had on him during the warm-ups. Yet, the self-professed 'normal one' said it had nothing to do with intimidating opponents. Instead, he was trying to gain knowledge about them.

"I have done it my whole career. My job is more or less done before the game, when they come together in the dressing room I'll say a few things, but I know my players. I just want to see and understand. Sometimes you see a player limping a little bit, you see a player do this or that... I just try to understand what they are doing. It's not so interesting when they are doing pure physical stuff, but when they are doing passing and these kind of things. Only one time I used it to intimidate the opponent. It was against my old club - Borussia Dortmund. I thought 'come on, let's do it'. If someone says I do it on purpose, it's not true. I just watch it."

It seems as though the clever tactic has accidentally created a secondary effect. Not only does it give Klopp the chance to react to what he sees and change his own approach to the game, but without realising it, he manages to get inside the heads of the opposition players.

James Tarkowski admits to being intimidated by Klopp

The Everton defender claimed he was worried about making a mistake

Not long after meeting with the Liverpool manager, Foster sat down with Everton defender James Tarkowski on an episode of the Fozcast. The topic of Klopp came up and Tarkowski revealed that he was fully aware of his presence during the pre-game warm-up.

"I like to be that end of the warm ups so I'm always quite high and can see Klopp gleaming at me from the side. I'm thinking 'I better make sure this pass is right', or he's going to walk into the dressing room and say 'that Tarkowski's having one in the warm-up, go and play on him'. I'm making sure every pass is crisp and I'm not giving it away. And if I give one away I'm thinking 'he's going to go in and tell those lads that I'm having one in the warm up there.'"

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