Can Klopp now press on?

Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool showed flashes of quality last season, but the challenge is to sustain it in 2016/17. Adam Bate examines the reasons for optimism and why that defeat to Burnley will have been such a blow to the German coach…

Liverpool’s trip to Tottenham on Sunday is a rerun of Jurgen Klopp’s first game in charge. In a keenly fought goalless draw, Klopp’s Liverpool became the first team to outrun Spurs last season – an early indication of how the new coach would look to implement his own style.

He had the plan but what is still debatable is whether or not he has the players. What Klopp certainly didn’t have last season was time. More matches meant fewer training sessions and Klopp frequently had the air of a man bemused by his own team’s schedule.

A fortnight after taking charge of his first Liverpool fixture, he’d already seen his side play five games in three different competitions. They were still unbeaten but that couldn’t last. Being freed from the demands of Europe this term was a source of real optimism.

By Klopp’s calculations, 20 fewer games means 50 more sessions available. “We have to use that time and we will do,” he said, quoted in the Liverpool Echo. “We believe in training, I have always said that. This time is not for a holiday. It is to get each little advantage you can in a season.”

The early signs were good. Liverpool ran four kilometres more than any other Premier League team on the opening weekend at Arsenal. Their intensity stood out as they made 75 more sprints too – 15 per cent more than anyone else. Most importantly, they won.

Liverpool are still top for distance covered and sprints after the …

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