Jurgen Klopp aims subtle dig at Ten Hag over Sancho Man United fallout

Jurgen Klopp appeared to aim a subtle dig at Erik ten Hag’s handling of Jadon Sancho’s Manchester United career as he took a swipe at the club’s transfer dealings when speaking at a farewell event on Tuesday night.

The 56-year-old former Liverpool manager was appearing at a special event at Liverpool’s M&S Bank Arena to celebrate his storied eight-and-a-half-year reign at Anfield.

Throughout the night, the German touched on a wide range of topics and discussed his time in English football after succeeding Brendan Rodgers as Liverpool manager in October 2015.

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But it was when talking about the club’s owners, Fenway Sports Group, that Klopp seemed to be unable to stop himself from taking a slight dig at Liverpool’s bitter rivals United, and more specifically Ten Hag’s handling of Sancho’s Old Trafford carer.

The 24-year-old forward made the move to United from Borussia Dortmund in July 2021 in a deal worth £73m, ending the Reds’ protracted pursuit of the England international.

However, after failing to find consistency under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, Ralf Rangnick and later Ten Hag in the first two years of his United career, Sancho has not played for the club since August 2023 after a public falling out with the Dutchman.

But when discussing Liverpool’s success in the transfer market Klopp insisted it is a manager’s job to get the best out of players and that Anfield chiefs wouldn’t have allowed him to write off an expensive asset, as United did by sending Sancho on out loan earlier this year.

“If the whole world loses trust and faith in the player then the manager has to be the one behind the player,” explained Klopp. “I cannot just buy into that ‘he’s useless’ stuff like other clubs did by the way. Buying a player for £80m and then sending him out on loan!”

Since returning to Germany in January, Sancho has appeared 20 times across all competitions for Dortmund and helped Edin Terzic’s side reach the Champions League final where they will face Real Madrid at Wembley on Saturday.