Klopp is in good spirits. There has been a noticeable spring in the Reds boss’ step this summer. He looks, sounds and feels like a man who is ready for business, who knows what is required and, crucially, believes in his ability to deliver.
Kiev already feels a long time ago. The pain of a Champions League final defeat may never fully be erased, but Klopp says he was ready to move on within hours of the final whistle. The following day, a video emerged online of him singing in his kitchen alongside a German punk band. He looked like a man who had ‘taken the L’ pretty well.
“You saw the video, yeah? Well, everybody obviously had a little bit too much alcohol, and when that happens then you should put all smartphones away! That’s the best advice. But I can say this; with all I have, I want to win. I hate losing. I have had to learn to accept it but I still hate it! But after the final whistle, I don’t waste my life suffering. I don’t take the defeat around with me, I go somewhere for a few moments and then I’m done. It cannot help to carry it around. You have to put it away, you can’t go through the game again and say ‘but this and that’. The things from the game are obvious and I can talk about them, but I don’t feel them. That’s how it is.”
The feeling leaving Kiev was that Liverpool would carry a lot of regrets back to Merseyside. Loris Karius’ errors, of which no further analysis needed, Mohamed Salah’s injury and Gareth Bale’s wonderstrike decided a game that, for long periods, had been closely fought.
For Klopp, it was another missed opportunity, another final gone. That’s six in a row he’s lost now, a fact he is acutely aware of.
That run started in 2013 with another Champions League final, a defeat for his Borussia Dortmund side at Wembley against Bayern Munich. But if we’re looking for similarities between Dortmund then and Liverpool now, then we’re barking up the wrong tree.
“It’s different, you’re right,” he says. “We lost Mario Gotze after that 2013 final – in fact we lost him two weeks before that!
“It was not ‘over’ for Dortmund after that final, we were still a good team who could finish second and get to the cup final and things like that, but it was not exactly the same, yes. Somebody came and thought ‘they’re too good, let’s try to avoid the next step!’
“With Liverpool, we never felt Kiev was the last step. We are in the middle of our development. We are not unbeatable, we are not the best team in the world but we have a specific style of play which makes us a really good side.
“I was really happy, for example, with how we played for half an hour in the final. I think before the game everyone felt ‘Real Madrid is the better team so they will win’ but after half an hour a lot of people who don’t watch us that often will have thought ‘game on!’
“I was happy with that, but we didn’t win so that’s that. We start again, we are silver-medallists in the Champions League, if you like, but we need to start over. We will get a really tough group, for sure, but we have to be ready. I think we will be.”