Liverpool

Jurgen Klopp defends Liverpool spending spree

By Daniel Lewis, Senior Reporter | 22 July 2018

Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp is pleased with his side's transfer activity in 2018 and insists that he will "do whatever it takes" to make the club successful.

Jurgen Klopp has insisted that he "will do whatever it takes to make Liverpool successful" after being forced to defend the club's spending spree.

The German coach famously criticised the Reds' arch-rivals Manchester United in the 2016 summer transfer window when they splashed out a then-record £89m to sign Paul Pogba from Juventus.

Speaking at the time, Klopp told reporters: "The day this is football, I'm not in a job anymore. I want to do it differently. I would even do it differently if I could spend that money."

Almost exactly two years on, however, Klopp has just brought in Alisson Becker for a fee of £67m, on top of signing Virgil van Dijk (£75m), Fabinho (£39m), Xherdan Shaqiri (£12m) and Naby Keita (£48m) since the turn of the year.

Speaking at the start of Liverpool's tour of the United States, the former Borussia Dortmund manager said that the transfer market has completely changed since he made those previous comments.

"I'll do whatever it takes to make Liverpool successful," he said. "I couldn't have imagined since then that the world would change like it has. Two years ago £100m was a crazy number. Since then the world has changed completely. First and foremost my responsibility is to make this club as successful as possible.

"It's not about pushing through my thoughts or saying 'No, I don't want to buy players, I don't want to pay big money' and then in the end Liverpool FC is not successful. We have a really good team, a really good squad and to improve it is expensive. To find better players than we already have, they aren't waiting around the corner.

"I really think so far it's been a really good year for us - very good squad, pretty successful last season, played some wonderful football, but still we needed to replace players. We don't care what the world around us is thinking, like Man United didn't care what I had to say about it.

"It was only an opinion in that moment. Did I change my opinion? Yes, it's true. But it's better to change opinion than not have one. That's it."

Liverpool have won three and drawn one of their four summer friendlies to date and face Borussia Dortmund in their next outing on Sunday evening.