"That would be the worst thing we could do now": Jürgen Klopp speaks plainly about Florian Wirtz
Germany coach Jürgen Klopp has robustly defended Florian Wirtz after difficult months at Liverpool - and announced that he will handle him carefully.
Klopp had originally only called up Florian Wirtz for the second squad for the Nations League matches against Serbia at home and Greece away. But after Jamal Musiala suffered a muscle fibre tear in the warm-up before the duel with the Netherlands, Klopp drafted him into his squad early.
Asked at a press conference on Saturday whether Wirtz was an immediate candidate for the starting XI for Sunday's home game against Greece in Augsburg, the new Germany head coach burst out laughing and replied: "That really would be a huge call. He found out yesterday morning, arrived here yesterday evening and then we say: now that you're here anyway, go on and play straight away. That would certainly be the wrongest thing we could do now."
Wirtz joined Klopp's former club Liverpool from Bayer Leverkusen in the summer of 2025 for 125 million euros. His first season was mixed, before he then endured a poor World Cup with the Germany national team. Wirtz is now established in attacking midfield at Liverpool, but is still searching for his top form.
Given Klopp's special status as a former Reds manager, he felt it made "no sense at all" to talk about Wirtz's situation at Liverpool. "That would go much too far and create headlines that we genuinely do not want to create now. No matter what I would say, whether positive or negative, it would be a huge story in this case."
"Wirtz came to Liverpool at the most unfortunate of all moments"
Even so, Klopp then spoke at length about Wirtz. "The footballing abilities of Flo Wirtz are beyond any doubt," Klopp explained. "We will work together on helping him show them on the pitch again every three days. We will absolutely try whatever we can contribute to that. In general, I think he is on a very good path. But the world we live in is basically such that things never happen quickly enough for people."
Klopp said Wirtz arrived at Liverpool in 2025 at the "most unfortunate of all moments. By that I don't mean that Liverpool won the title the year before, but rather the tragic death of Diogo Jota. He came into a squad with an incredible number of players for whom, entirely understandably, football had slipped down the list of priorities at that moment. Then you come in as a new player and everyone immediately longs for someone to pull their chestnuts out of the fire. That is impossible. This year has passed and he has certainly learned a lot. Now we are in a new season with a new coach."
How have Liverpool and Wirtz started the season?
Following a season without a trophy, Liverpool parted company with Arne Slot in the summer and Andoni Iraola took over. After five matches, Liverpool are sixth in the Premier League with nine points. They have also opened with wins in the League Cup against Tottenham Hotspur and in the Champions League against Atletico Madrid. Wirtz has started six of their seven competitive matches so far and has one assist.
As Klopp sees it, Wirtz is "physically in a very good condition", but Liverpool are "once again in the process of finding themselves. Attacking players always need a functioning team to take care of everything around them. When you are always in the spotlight, it is not easy," Klopp said, before returning to his opening point: "I have already said far too much about it. I hope I have remained general enough."
Finally, he said: "It was simply a very unfortunate situation. But everyone who loves football can still see what an extraordinary player he is. We cannot do any more than integrate him into our team with enough training time and gradually give him confidence, a good feeling and ideally positive experiences, and then send him back to Liverpool."
