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Football

30th Jun 2020

Hamburg: The club that rejected Jurgen Klopp

Wayne Farry

jurgen klopp

Has a club ever made a worse decision?

This month Jurgen Klopp guided Liverpool to their first league title in 30 years, after a season in which they dominated the Premier League in a way that few teams have done before.

800 miles away, Bundesliga II side Hamburg suffered a spectacular collapse of post-lockdown form, suffering consecutive defeats in their two final league games, leaving them outside of the play-off places in the final league table.

These two disparate events may seem entirely unrelated, but they represent the massively different trajectories that these two parties have found themselves on over the past 12 years.

In 2008, Hamburg had the opportunity to hire Klopp as their manager while he was in charge of Mainz. However, they were reportedly unimpressed by a number of things about him, from his smoking and demeanour to the fact that he wore ripped jeans.

It’s a decision that continues to look worse with every passing moment.