Pep Lijnders explains exit and return to Liverpool

Liverpool assistant coach Pep Lijnders has explained how he returned to the club in 2018 under Jurgen Klopp.

Lijnders spent three seasons between 2014 and 2017, working under Brendan Rodgers originally before Jurgen Klopp took over in October 2015. The assistant then went on to take a managerial position at Dutch side NEC, but was sacked in May 2018 after failing to gain promotion to the Eredivisie.

Speaking on the Training Ground Guru podcast, the Lijnders explained why he left Liverpool originally in 2017, admitting that the reduction of his involvement in training played a huge part in his decision.

"With Jurgen, you don't know how it's going to be. I thought, 'Okay, I really need to try to learn'. Of course I knew the Dortmund team and how they play. Then I saw training and then I saw the meeting and the way he spoke and I thought, 'Ah, really really good'. I thought, ''How he explains is better than how I do it' and every day Iike this, a paper, a complete A4 full with words, what he said, what he did, training. I still have these books at home," Lijnders explained.

"It was a nice period but unstable, because under Brendan I would be the coach, I would deliver all the sessions. With Jurgen, with time he asked more and more and I gave more sessions, but I was not planning the training, I was just delivering the ideas or the sessions.

"I needed more, which is why, in the end, I left."

After his stint at NEC, Lijnders also revealed that Klopp personally rang him and asked for him to return as his second in command at Anfield: "Three months later I was at NEC Nijmegen, beginning of April he called, 'Pep, I will probably be searching for a number two. I feel we can conquer the world together - what do you think?'"

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