Bill Connelly, ESPN Staff Writer
The well-orchestrated goodbye festivities are over. The successor, Arne Slot, has been named and started the job officially on June 1. The Instagram account has been created. Jurgen Klopp is no longer Liverpool‘s manager, and the Premier League — and soccer as a whole — has one fewer larger-than-life figure in its midst.
Klopp popularized the intense, counterpressing style that took over large portions of club soccer in the 2010s, and in an era of financial super heavyweights, he took a big club and figured out how to keep pace with the biggest. His Reds won six trophies. They were the best non-Manchester City team in the Premier League three times, and they’re the reason City hasn’t won seven straight league titles. They were the best non-Real Madrid team in the Champions League three times as well, though they twice fell in the finals to the all-time European champions.
When he had to lean on young players, Klopp brought out the best of them, be it a future star like Trent Alexander-Arnold, who debuted at age 18 in 2016, or the three little-used teenagers (Jayden Danns, James McConnell, Bobby Clark) who had to play major roles in this year’s League Cup final victory.
He also worked for a club that was able to put him in an excellent position to succeed. For all of his managerial prowess, after all, Klopp didn’t exactly win the Bundesliga or Champions League at Mainz, did he?
– O’Hanlon: How Liverpool decided on Arne Slot (E+)
Liverpool threw itself into analytics, searched for as many small edges as possible, and transformed itself as a club not only through the hire of Klopp in October 2015, but also through its incredible success rate in the signings department. They unearthed a number of low-priced gems and when they splurged, they tended to hit. Obviously Klopp’s own managerial talents played a role in that success rate, but as we move on from the Klopp era and Slot surveys what he has to work with in the squad, let’s look back at the club’s best and worst signings from that time.
Klopp arrived a couple of months after a summer that had included the signings of future key pieces such as Roberto Firmino, Joe Gomez and James Milner and the more ill-fitting Danny Ings and Christian Benteke. Players such as Alexander-Arnold were in the youth pipeline, as well. But from Nos. 1 to 39, here are the best and worst deals Liverpool made with Klopp in charge.