Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp warns old foe Pep Guardiola he’s taking on the biggest challenge of his life at Man City
PEP GUARDIOLA cantered to the Bundesliga in each of his three seasons in Germany.
He turned Barcelona into arguably the greatest club side of all time as he conquered Europe during four years at the Nou Camp.
Yet the Spaniard still faces the shock of his life as he tries to rule the Premier League with Manchester City.
That is the warning from Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp.
When ex-Dortmund chief Klopp replaced Brendan Rodgers at Anfield last October, he knew he was stepping into the most fiercely fought domestic competition in the world. It was anything but plain sailing as the Reds finished eighth.
Klopp swiftly discovered that, while the big guns may only have a couple of serious title rivals in Spain, Italy or Germany, in England it is a far different story.
He discovered that in an opening seven months that saw Liverpool swat aside both Chelsea and City, then get embarrassed by the likes of Watford, Newcastle and Swansea.
The competition will be fiercer than anything Guardiola or new Chelsea chief Antonio Conte have ever encountered.
Klopp knows what can happen if he is not ready to meet the task head on.
The German warned: “Winning the title in England is the biggest challenge of them all. There are the most teams who can do it. That’s the difference, 100 per cent.
“If you are four times in a row Spanish champions, three times in a row Bundesliga champions, then you think, ‘OK, let’s try something else’. And if you are looking for the biggest challenge then you need to go to England.
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“In Germany it isn’t easy because all the clubs take points from each other. But if you want to be in front of Bayern you have to win all the others and then a minimum of one against them, because they never lose.
“In England there are a few who have always been playing Champions League in recent years but nobody is satisfied because another team has always been better. In this country it’s a very different kind of difficulty. Here you have a number of clubs who think they should be No 1.
“In Germany there is one team who think they have to be and one team who think they should be. The rest hope.”
As Klopp gears up for his first full season in charge, he expects Liverpool to be among those mounting a serious challenge this time.
The signings are his, the departures are down to him, he has had a full pre-season to prepare, including an impressive 2-0 win over Milan.
He added: “What I can say is we will be a challenger, we will fight for everything, for every cup and we’ll see what happens. We should not look for excuses and say things like, ‘I need another year’. We built this team only to be successful, not one where we say we will have to wait.
“We need a big group, players for different positions and that is what we have. We need versatile players and we have that, so we can be a really strong formation. So we are really optimistic but the problem is the other contenders are optimistic, too.”