Official: Former Liverpool Assistant Pep Lijnders Sacked by RB Salzburg
Things have ended badly for top Jürgen Klopp assistant Pepijn Lijnders in his second attempt to establish himself as a manager.
It will take more than four promising months under the guidance of new head coach Arne Slot to fully and fairly judge exactly how Liverpool are adjusting to life after Jürgen Klopp, but the early signs at least are highly promising.
For Klopp in the meantime, some well earned travel and a cushy consultancy gig with the Red Bull football group has been the answer to life after Liverpool. For former star assistant Pepijn Lijnders, though, the transition has been less smooth.
An exclamation point was put on that fact today when the Dutch manager was officially sacked by Red Bull Salzburg—or, to quote the press release, Lijnders was “released from his duties” as he and Salzburg have chosen to “part ways.”
The only surprise, perhaps, is how long it’s taken. Lijnders was brought in to put Salzburg back on top, with the the Austrian Bundesliga’s biggest spenders expected to win the league every year but having stumbled last season.
Instead, nothing has seemed to work out. Salzburg aren’t just not-first, they’re currently in a tie with Wolfsberg in fourth and a full ten points off the leaders. In Europe, they’re 32nd in the table with just three points from a single win in six games.
Meanwhile, none of their summer signings—notably Bobby Clark, a £10M transfer from Liverpool, and Stefan Bajčetić on loan—have impressed. For Lijnders, this marks a second managerial attempt that has ended quickly and badly.
Lijnders previously took over NEC in the Dutch second tier in January of 2018 before being sacked in May the same year. At 41 years of age there is still time for him to prove he can be an effective manager, but the signs aren’t promising.
At Salzburg, on paper Lijnders had been given everything he needed to succeed—a team and network that played a similar style to the one at Liverpool, a outlier of a big budget in a weaker league, and backing in the transfer market.
That it has ended the same way and in the same amount of time as his first effort to establish himself as a manager will likely make finding another headlining gig difficult. It will be interesting to see, then, what comes next for Lijnders.
Source: liverpooloffside.sbnation.com
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