November 23 – Within minutes of his team’s latest victory being shown on Sky and transmitted round the world, Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp hit out at both Sky and BT Sport, the English game’s main two broadcast partners, over fixture scheduling which he claimed was responsible for a mounting number of injuries among the Premier League’s big-hitters.
Klopp’s defending champions pulled off one of their most impressive performances of the season on Sunday to mark a club-record 64th home game without defeat as they beat in-form Leicester City 3-0 to go joint of the league despite being without a string of key players.
Klopp saw Naby Keita limp off to join the likes of Virgil van Dijk, Joe Gomez, Jordan Henderson and Trent Alexander-Arnold on the sidelines.
Asked by Sky why he waited until the 89th minute to make two of his three substitutions, Klopp launched into a tirade about the frequency of games.
“Why we change late is because we constantly have to think that somebody will go down with an injury,” he said. “We cannot change early, because (if) we change early and the other one has an injury, and you end the game with nine players,.”
“It’s about all the players, it’s about the England players, it’s about all the players who will play the European Championship next summer – if you (Sky) don’t start talking to BT, we’re done.”
Klopp said the combination of Champions League broadcasts and early weekend kick-offs is putting too great a strain on players.
“If we keep playing Wednesday and Saturday at 1230, I’m not sure if you’ll finish the season with 11 players. All the top six (teams) are the same, but I know you (the broadcasters) don’t care, and that’s the problem,” he fumed.
“People tell us we can rotate – who? We have offensive players, the rest are kids. That’s how it is. It’s all OK, we fight with what we have, but if you (broadcasters) do not start talking, you will see what happens.”
“We cannot change 10, 11 positions, that’s not possible. We can’t only show up, we have to win the football games.”
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