The managerial announcements came on a daily basis last week. First Jurgen Klopp signed a four-year contract to stay at Liverpool. Then Antonio Conte channelled his inner Donald Trump to describe reports suggesting he was bound for Paris Saint-Germain as “fake news”. Time will tell if the word “fake” was superfluous and Conte trades the British capital for its French counterpart. Few should be surprised if he does.
When they meet at Anfield on Saturday, it is as two of the world’s elite managers and as opposites, separated by far more than the distance between the dugouts or the contrasting fortunes in the race for Luis Diaz in January. Klopp offers continuity, Conte perpetual change. The German can seem a whirlwind, whipping up the crowd and playing 100mph football but he is already the Premier League’s longest serving manager. Stay at Anfield until 2026, as he is now contracted to, and no one will have lasted longer there since Bill Shankly. Should Simon Weaver, Gareth Ainsworth and John Coleman find alternative employment in the meantime, he will be the longest serving in the Premier League and the Football League. He will, like Arsene Wenger, be the exotic import who became part of the furniture.
