Jurgen Klopp is a better tactical manager than Pep Guardiola - he just doesn't get the credit

Jurgen Klopp doesn’t get nearly enough credit for how he’s tactically transformed Liverpool during his time on Merseyside. 

Whereas everything Pep Guardiola and Mikel Arteta do is analysed to the nth degree, the majority of fans and pundits treat Klopp as though he wouldn’t be able to spell tactical analysis.

Perhaps it is because the loveable German boss is a great man manager and people just assume you can only be a man-manager or a tactician, likely because Guardiola and his disciples aren’t exactly famed for the former. It is possible to be both, though.

Maybe it is because Klopp is the antithesis of what people have come to expect from a tactical mastermind.

People see their favourite managers doing puppet shows with their hands to get their points across during games while you just hear Klopp bellowing some choice words at players from the touchline.

In the nicest way possible, the departing German is goofy. And there just seems to be an idea that Liverpool have won they have over the years because he’s managed to eke out that extra 10% out of players. That likely has played a huge part in the success, but so have the tactics that, outside of the Liverpool sphere, tend to be ignored.

In truth, I don’t think any team has had such a dramatic change in style in the way Liverpool have under Klopp. Not under one single manager.

Obviously, a new manager comes in and puts their stamp on things and this can be quite the contrast. Think Arteta at Arsenal, Guardiola at Manchester City and Ange Postecoglou at Spurs. But these guys are wed to a style.

Klopp is different. He arrived at Anfield and one of the first things he said was that he wanted to bring the opposition down to Liverpool’s level. That isn’t verbatim but it does tally up with what he said during his first press conference following his appointment.

“I am not the guy who is going to go out and shout ‘we are going to conquer the world’ or something like this. We will conquer the ball. Yeah? Each f------ time. We will chase the ball. We will run more, we will fight more.

“We will work more together, better together. We will have better organisation in defence than the other teams. We have to find our own way to play. Our performances have to be enjoyable for ourselves.

“This team needs to create their own style. If you have the ball you have to be creative but you have to be prepared that if you lose the ball the counter pressing is very important. It is not a proposal, it is law – you have to do it and you will.”

The German tactician first made Liverpool difficult to play against with his full-throttle football. And the Reds scored a lot of goals. During his first season with the club, his team scored three goals or more in eight of his 30 Premier League matches. For added context, they scored three or more against Chelsea, Arsenal and Manchester City.

Liverpool dragged these better teams down to their level and then annihilated them in transition. The style and tactics worked but other teams looked to slow things down, so they would cede possession to the Reds, and this caused problems.

Opposition teams would give up the ball and look to just control the space around their own area. Liverpool weren’t necessarily built for possession football, they didn’t have the patience or the know-how of how to deal with 65% possession.

So Klopp was forced to tweak things. The Reds added more pace in the final third and looked to bring in better ball-carriers in the midfield third, such as Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Naby Keita. This would allow his team to create their own transitional moments.

Then the emergence of Andrew Robertson and Trent Alexander-Arnold altered the way the team attacked.

Virgil van Dijk and Alisson changed the way Liverpool defended.

The point here is Liverpool have altered their style on an almost yearly basis. At first they had to but they soon realised perpetual change meant it was difficult for opponents to stop them.

We’ve seen a false-9 morph into more of a traditional centre-forward in the system. The roles of the two No8s are now dramatically different. There was even a time when Liverpool effectively played with two centre-forwards with Sadio Mane and Diogo Jota sharing the left-wing and striker positions. The defensive midfielder, supposedly a huge issue at the start of the season, is now more of a playmaker than a destroyer. The Reds are comfortable having 70% possession, in fact, they go into games expecting that level of control.

Under Klopp, Liverpool have gone from seeking chaos to demanding control. That is a seismic shift in playing style and it has had an impact on tactics. Yet the casual fan and many pundits talk about this team as though it is still the 2017/18 iteration.

The former BVB boss has done more tactically to Liverpool than Guardiola has done at Manchester City. Just without the plaudits, acclaim or fanfare.