Jürgen Klopp has called on the media not to get carried away with England’s showing in their forthcoming friendlies against Germany and Brazil.
Gareth Southgate’s side face the world’s two highest-ranking nations at Wembley on Friday and next Tuesday respectively as they begin their build-up to next summer’s World Cup.
Despite the games being only friendlies, there is a level of excitement around the fixtures, partly because of the calibre of opposition and partly because of the fresh and youthful nature of Southgate’s squad. The head coach has dropped seven players from England’s previous get-together, including Daniel Sturridge, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Chris Smalling, while drafting in Joe Gomez, 20, Ruben Loftus-Cheek, 21, and Tammy Abraham, 20.
The hope is that England play with renewed vigour against the current World Cup holders and the five-times winners of the competition and, in the process, lay down a marker for the finals in Russia. But Klopp has called for caution and even suggested in his own inimitable style that the Football Association may have made a mistake in choosing two such strong opponents for England to face in what will be their final assignments of 2017.
“If you want to play a friendly you should choose another team than Germany. And Brazil is the second one, that’s really funny,” said the Liverpool manager. “All the journalists need to cool down and don’t expect too much. It’s not that they [England] cannot win, of course, but you make it too big if they win, too big if they lose.
“When qualification was over, people said now the problems start because the tournament is coming up. So England has a bunch of fantastic young players, that’s how it is. I’m not sure how Germany will line up but it’s a very good game for sure but I would not say it should be a sign for the future.”
Klopp, who moved to England from his native Germany in October 2015 when he was appointed as Brendan Rodgers’ successor at Anfield, feels a far better gauge of England’s prospects is the success they have enjoyed at youth level, with the under-17s’ recent World Cup triumph following on the back of the under-19s winning the European Championship and the under-20s also being crowned world champions.
“The sign for the future was the Under-17 and the Under-20 World Cup successes,” Klopp said. “We have to make sure they are coming through.”