Liverpool Manager Jurgen Klopp, who moved from Borussia Dortmund to Anfield in October, experienced a very emotional homecoming tonight. Thursday marked his first chance to face his former club in the quarter-finals of UEFA Europa League. Klopp led BVB for seven years before stepping down in 2015. The match ended in a 1-1 draw.
Here’s a collection to some of the better news and feature stories covering this event.
-(The Guardian) So intense was the pre?match excitement in Dortmund over the return of the prodigal Jürg – much of it media-led – that walking around this flat, functional city on the afternoon of the game you half expected to stumble across Klopp shrines, New Orleans-style Klopp jazz funerals, to look up and find his great beaming visage looming over the city like some vast alien saucer.
And yet for all the soap opera something unexpected happened at the Westfalenstadion. A football match broke out – and a gripping one, too.
–ESPN FC’s Rory Smith has documented the friendly relationship between the two opponents in the Jurgen Klopp Cup, with his piece entitled: “Jurgen Klopp’s Dortmund return with Liverpool is a premature homecoming.”
There is, after all, Liverpool merchandise on sale in the club shop: key-rings, pint glasses, all manner of tat. The half-and-half scarves have been available ever since the draw was made. The clubs have been engaged in warm, amicable social media repartee — let’s not call it banter — for several days.
At the root of the entente cordiale, of course, is Klopp, the man who crafted this modern manifestation of Borussia Dortmund. Most of his former players have spent the last few days eulogising his influence, insisting they cannot wait to see him again; the majority of his former fans, too, feel not a trace of bitterness towards him.
–Micah Peters of FOX Soccer as an essay headlined “Chances are Jurgen Klopp Will cry at Liverpool-Dortmund we will too.”
Like any homecoming, Jurgen Klopp’s return to the Signal Iduna Park on Thursday night to face his old club, Borussia Dortmund, with his new club,Liverpool, is bound to present a tannic cocktail of emotions he’s never tasted before. There may very well be tears. And maybe a few meditations on why he left in the first place.
-Via NBC’s Pro Soccer Talk: “Klopp claims knowledge of Dortmund players doesn’t give Liverpool Edge.”
-To mark Klopp’s return tonight, German broadcaster Sport1 planned to have a “Klopp Cam” on him for the entire match. The “Klopp Cam” was to be available to document his every emotion and reaction to the game. It has since been scrapped. When asked about idea of “Klopp Cam,” the German had a very funny reaction that you can read here at this link.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, partnered with FOX Sports Engage Network. and News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, currently contributes regularly to the Chicago Tribune’s RedEye publication and Bold Global.
He also consistently appears on numerous talk shows all across the country. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram