Jurgen Klopp Outlines Liverpool's Long-Term Plans After Signing New Contract at Anfield
By Ben Carter
Jürgen Klopp insists that Liverpool will no longer have to make wholesale changes in the transfer market to keep their squad competitive, following the signing of a new long-term contract on Merseyside.
The 52-year-old will become the club's longest-serving manager since Bob Paisley if he stays at Anfield until 2024, helping to establish Liverpool as a genuine title challenger since his arrival in 2015.
There's only a handful of first-team players who have stayed part of Liverpool's squad throughout Klopp's reign at the club, and the former Borussia Dortmund boss insists even fewer changes will have to be made in the next few years.
"We have to change," Klopp said, quoted by the Liverpool Echo. "We have to make changes and that is normal. I have no clue how and who, but that is completely normal.
"We have to refresh things in moments, we have to change some things, but this team will always be the core set, the basis for all other teams following.
"There is no need to make the same number of changes that we made in the last four and a half years in the next four and a half years. Absolutely not.
"This is an outstanding team and we never could have imagined we could get a group like this together but of course there will be things.
"A player might want to leave which is OK, then we have to bring in the right replacement.
"Whatever happens, this four and a half year contract is very good news for all the young players in the academy at the moment.
"I know the boys already who are in now like Curtis [Jones], Harvey [Elliott]. Harvey turns 21 when my contract ends!
"That is all great news for these boys. We want to use them, we want to involve them in the team and all that stuff even more so."
While a lot has been made of the squad that Klopp has assembled at Liverpool, his work with youth players since 2015 has also helped with the club's meteoric rise.
Trent Alexander-Arnold was given his first chance to impress in the Premier League by Klopp, while current academy stars like Ben Woodburn and Ki-Jana Hoever, as well as Bournemouth loanee Harry Wilson, all put on Liverpool's shirt for the first time at a senior level following the German's arrival.
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