Jürgen Klopp Reflects on Champions League Glory and All That Came After

Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images

The Liverpool manager opened up on a “brilliant” day in Madrid a year ago.

A year ago today, Liverpool were in Madrid to play in the Champions League final, a game that saw Jürgen Klopp’s Reds lifting the club’s sixth European Cup after they comfortably defeated league rivals Tottenham by a score of two goals to nil.

“Just time flies, that’s how it is,” Klopp said, reflecting on the win and then all that came after. “Today a year ago we played the game. How we knew afterwards, it became one of the biggest days in our lives—a wonderful experience, sensational.

“The things that happened afterwards, that we could then play the European Super Cup, play the World Cup, and all that stuff. In the moment you get told you have to play them, it’s like, ‘Wow, really, where should we fit them in?’ But it was brilliant.”

There may have been questions raised about the resulting fixture congestion, but in the end Liverpool handled it just as they had the final, winning the Super Cup and Club World Cup while running out to an unassailable 25-point lead in the league.

And it’s hardly a stretch to suggest that this season’s successes were very much built on the foundation of the last, on their Champions League glory in Madrid and a on that painful but commendable 97-point, second-place domestic campaign.

“The next time we are in a similar situation I will really look forward to it more than I did last time,” Klopp added. “Now I know how good it felt when you won it. But it all started with the Champions League and that was massive, a big day, great.

“One year ago the world was in a different place, that’s true as well, but we will get there again and I can’t wait. That’s what it’s all about, that we collect these stories and tell them to other people. I’m delighted we are part of these stories now.”

Source: liverpooloffside.sbnation.com