Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp praises Tottenham for keeping hold of best players

Jürgen Klopp has admitted that he admires Tottenham Hotspur’s ability to hold onto their best players as he prepares to welcome Mauricio Pochettino’s side to Anfield on Sunday.

The Liverpool manager reluctantly allowed Philippe Coutinho to join Barcelona in a £142m deal during last month’s transfer window, despite the club’s previous insistence that their most influential player would not be allowed to leave.

Tottenham have come under similar pressure from the Iberian peninsula in recent years, as speculation has linked Harry Kane and Dele Alli with Real Madrid.

Barcelona were also understood to be interested in playmaker Christian Eriksen until the capture of Coutinho.

So far, however, Tottenham have managed to hold onto the majority of their first team, with only right-back Kyle Walker leaving for Manchester City in a £50m deal last summer. Danny Rose remains in north London too, despite grumblings about the club’s strict wage structure.

Klopp is impressed that Pochettino, together with chairman Daniel Levy, has managed to keep Europe’s elite at arm’s length and resist their advances up to this point.

“That they can keep their squad together for so long is a big sign, to be honest,” he said on Friday.

“Harry Kane is still there, the whole world is going nuts obviously transfer-wise and I think if someone has too much money or more than enough then it would make sense to ask: ‘Don’t you want to play for our team?’

“He is obviously at an outstanding top level since I was in England, at least. Dele Alli not the same season as last season but still the highest quality, Eriksen constantly, [Heung-Min] Son really good, [Moussa] Sissoko made a step again and back to the player he was at Newcastle, [Victor] Wanyama not in but [Eric] Dier is there.

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“They are just a good side and they are still together,” he added. “The whole world buys players from everywhere but no one buys one player from Tottenham,” bar, of course, the loss of Walker.

“Maybe they don’t want to go. You can imagine working together helps a lot. With these players and their age group, the players are closer to 20 than 30, so that is a very, very interesting project.”

Klopp has previously spoken about how Pochettino’s Tottenham and his Liverpool are on two similar trajectories.

Both have young squads, both employ a high-energy pressing game and, as mentioned, both have had to learn to live with the elite taking an interest in their best players.

In Klopp’s first two seasons in English football though, the north Londoners finished higher than his side in the table while mustering up something of title challenge each time.

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This year, while Manchester City run clear at top, the gap between two clubs has narrowed. Liverpool, in fact, have generally found themselves above Pochettino’s side, though the current gap stands at just two points.

Klopp is not ready to claim that his players have finally caught up with Tottenham just yet and knows that, in any case, his reign at Anfield will be judged on whether Liverpool manage to finish above every member of the ‘top six’ and end their long wait for a league title in the process.

“We could beat Tottenham,” he said. Since I came here they have been ahead of us and maybe, I am not sure, this is the first moment we are ahead of Tottenham. But it is only two points. It is nothing.”

Klopp added: “Before the game it makes it interesting but in the end I think to fulfil our dreams at some points we have to overtake all of them, that is how it is.

“We cannot decide when or which. We have to be ready for achieving the biggest thing.”