(Reuters) – Liverpool manager Juergen Klopp said he is not being “too loyal” to long-serving players who are underperforming at the club but that a lack of adequate replacements means he has to keep picking them.
Liverpool have failed to mount a Premier League title challenge this season and are down the table in ninth – 19 points behind leaders Arsenal.
“I am loyal, I think everyone should be loyal, but I am not too loyal,” Klopp told reporters ahead of Liverpool’s FA Cup third-round replay at Wolverhampton Wanderers.
“You have a good player who did a lot of good stuff in the past and then maybe, in your mind, you think: ‘That’s it for him now.’ If you can then go out and bring in another player to replace him then it makes sense from both sides.
“If you cannot bring anybody in then you cannot take anyone out, that’s the situation.”
Before joining Liverpool Klopp led Borussia Dortmund to two Bundesliga titles and a Champions League final but left when they finished seventh.
“When I left Dortmund I said: ‘Something has to change here.’ It was a different situation there but in a way it’s similar. Either I go … or a lot of other things change,” said Klopp, whose Liverpool contract runs until 2026.
“As far as I know, from what I hear, I will not go. So that means maybe there’s a point where we have to change other stuff and we will see that. But it’s something for the future, like in the summer, not now.”
(Reporting by Rohith Nair in Bengaluru; Editing by Peter Rutherford)
