Gary Lineker labelled Jurgen Klopp “spectacularly tone deaf” after the Liverpool manager urged football supporters to “calm down” over the European Super League saga. The sport, particularly in England, is still reeling from the attempt of 12 Premier League, La Liga and Serie A clubs to form a breakaway league this week.
Klopp told BT Sport before Liverpool’s clash with Newcastle on Saturday: “Look, it hurt a lot. The thing was that yes our owners made a mistake. We’ve said it often enough, they know it and these kind of things.
“What I didn’t like in that moment was it – the Leeds supporters were a good example, they went on us. We had nothing to do with that, we are just the face of the club. Our supporters had nothing to do with that.
“We didn’t even have the idea, we had nothing to do about it and that’s what for me is really important that we don’t forget that. It’s constantly mentioned, Liverpool Football Club, Liverpool Football Club – no, it was not Liverpool Football Club.
“It was representatives of Liverpool Football Club, we have to make a difference. That’s really very important. I see the pictures the last few days of the Arsenal and Chelsea stuff like this… I really think, you all have to calm down.”
But Lineker was not happy about Klopp’s comments and took to Twitter to say: “A handful of owners try to tear our game apart and may well try to do so again, and we’re just told to ‘calm down and move on’.
“Huge admirer of Klopp but he’s spectacularly tone deaf here. Without the fans of our beautiful game it would be much uglier today.”
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