The end of the 2021/22 season was a time of almost nonstop work for Liverpool as they chased a quadruple, but there was one night when the club’s staff let their hair down.
By mid-April, Liverpool had already won the Carabao Cup and still had their sights on the FA Cup, Premier League and Champions League. It was a time of preparation, squad rotation and intense focus for Jurgen Klopp and his side.
But on Wednesday, April 20 – the day after a thumping 4-0 win over Manchester United at Anfield and three days before the Merseyside derby – there was a gap in the schedule. A gap big enough to squeeze in a stag do. It was elite development coach Vitor Matos' bachelor party – and they weren’t about to let the opportunity slide.
Klopp’s assistant manager, Pep Lijnders, was there on that booze-fuelled night in Liverpool and his new book, Pep Lijnders Intensity: Inside Liverpool FC - Our Identity, details some of what went on.
“Our plan was to surprise him in the afternoon by taking our big red team bus to his house to pick him up,” Lijnders writes. “We were then going to go bowling at PINS in the city centre before another surprise for him at Bacaro where all of his family and friends would be waiting for him with a glass of champagne.
“John Achterberg (goalkeeping coach) even prepared a Benfica shirt for him to wear with his name on the back… you can’t provoke a Porto boy more than by doing exactly this. It would hurt and go directly to his heart!
“The bowling was really good fun; four teams of four, with Carl Spellman [one of our transport providers] and Billy Hogan the standout players. Ray [Haughan] made sure Vitor got his own cup full of beer with some special rules: every time he left the bus he needed to drink, every time he spoke Portuguese he needed to drink (which led to so many funny discussions between him and [Claudio] Taffarel and every time one of us threw a strike he needed to drink. Everyone would sing Allez Allez Allez. The mood was just insane.
“Ray’s history as a travel leader came back and in these moments he is like the devil and made sure the cup was always full to the brim. ‘We don’t win the Champions League with that attitude, Vitor,’ he said when our Benfica guy struggled to down his tenth beer.
Vitor said back: ‘The beer tastes like vodka now!’ But that wasn’t the worst part for him… we drove through the city centre and at any moment in time, upon our command, he needed to sing a Liverpool song outside the bus. For example, a rendition of Allez, Allez, Allez in the middle of the docks, You’ll Never Walk Alone in front of the Hilton.
“The bus was bouncing, people were staring. What the…? they must have been thinking, a guy in a Benfica shirt outside of Liverpool’s team bus singing Liverpool songs?!
"At one point, which people later saw on social media, Jürgen left the bus to enter Jürgen’s Bar when we stopped next to it in front of a red traffic light. All of the people inside thought he was a doppelganger, which made the moment of realisation that this was actually Jürgen Klopp so funny.
“The dinner party at Bacaro made for such a lovely time. His whole family was there and it became a real wedding party. We danced, sang and celebrated. Mission accomplished.
"Waking up the next day, we spotted that one of the newspapers had run a story about Jürgen’s appearance in the bar. It said he took some photos with fans and even a Benfica supporter. I couldn’t stop laughing at it.”
Pep Lijnders Intensity: Inside Liverpool FC - Our Identity, published by Reach Sport, is on sale August 4 from Amazon
