After one of the games of the Premier League season finished with a 94th-minute winner, the collective Liverpool mood should have been a celebratory one. Yet as Jurgen Klopp faced the media to give his post-match reaction after that pulsating 4-3 win over Tottenham on Sunday, the atmosphere was tense.
It's possible that Klopp's disposition had been darkened by the hamstring injury he was nursing after pulling up in celebration of Diogo Jota's last-gasp and scarcely believable winning goal. Or perhaps, as is more likely, the lion's share of the frustration had come from another unwanted interaction with Paul Tierney, the referee who had booked him for his overzealous celebrations in the face of fourth official John Brooks around half an hour earlier.
"We have our history with Tierney," Klopp told Sky Sports shortly before facing the wider media inside Anfield's press room. "I really don't know what he has against us. He has said there [are] no problems but that cannot be true? How he looks at me, I don't understand it. In England nobody has to clarify these situations, it's really tricky and hard to understand. What he said to me when he gave me the yellow card is not OK."
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A terse Klopp later added: "The problem is I have to mention it because you don’t speak about it. Paul Tierney gave us, in a season which was quite important, he didn’t give Harry Kane a red card - I love Harry Kane, what a player, today again – my god - he’s pretty much unplayable.
"That day, he didn’t get a red card but Robbo got a red card. We drew 2-2, you might remember it? (December 2021). It was not the first time, there are so many things. Just little ones and nobody in the stadium wanted the foul in the situation with Mo Salah, the linesman was completely calm – both hands down, and he whistled.
"Of course we are emotional in these moments. It’s difficult. It is not okay we shouldn’t do that, yes, we are role models, all clear. But we are human beings first and foremost. Before you are a role model you’re a human being and that happens in the moment.
"But I didn’t say a bad word to the fourth official – not at all – and he wouldn’t have deserved it anyway because he didn’t do anything wrong but I turned around to the fourth official, celebrated in that direction and pulled my hamstring probably in that moment.
"So fair enough, all good. I’m already punished, I got a yellow card on top of that, I think he thought I should have got a different punishment but because of the fourth official, it was a yellow card. That’s it. We have to ask Mr Tierney what is going on.
"I know what you want now. I don’t want to make the story [bigger]. I’ve probably already said absolutely too much but I cannot help you now more with the story you write tomorrow. I said what I said, probably too much and now write what you want to write."
Insiders at the Football Association have so far intimated the fact that Klopp was cautioned for his celebration is an indication that it was seen by the officials and will require no further action, but also that his post-match reflections are being looked into.
Klopp's suggestion that Tierney made a comment that "was not OK" upon dishing out the card has subsequently been rejected by the PGMOL, with a statement, released on Sunday night, claiming: "Match officials in the Premier League are recorded in all games via a communications system and having fully reviewed the audio of referee Paul Tierney from today's fixture, we can confirm he acted in a professional manner throughout including when issuing the caution to the Liverpool manager."
Klopp has never shied away from his dislike of seeing Tierney in possession of the whistle for Liverpool games, and the fact the manager made reference to another fixture against Tottenham as far back as December 2021 shows how such a grudge has festered.
From penalties that were not given at Newcastle in December 2020, to the half-time whistle being blown against Manchester United to cut short a huge Sadio Mane chance a few weeks later, all the way through a deciding not to send Harry Kane off for a rash challenge on Andy Roberson in that aforementioned 2021 game; there is a laundry list of decisions made by the official that have fuelled the stance from Klopp.
Tierney was the man in charge when a winning goal for Dominic Solanke was ruled out in a home draw with West Brom in 2017, while the Greater Manchester official also irked the Reds manager by telling him to "get over it" during a victory over Aston Villa in an empty Anfield in July 2020 after failing to award a foul on Gini Wijnaldum; a demand that was audible to those limited few inside the ground that day due to its behind-closed-doors nature.
Add in the fact that Robertson was somehow booked for his reaction to being elbowed by Constantine Hatzidakis in the 2-2 draw with Arsenal last month by, you guessed it, Tierney and the body of evidence for why the referee remains off the Christmas card list at the Klopps is compelling.
"I don't know what the solution is with Tierney, in terms of whether he could be taken off our games for the time being," says ECHO columnist John Aldridge. "Liverpool could make a complaint, but I don't know how far you could take that. Jurgen doesn't really come out with the things he did after the game, so is there an issue of some sort for him to be so emotional about it?"
It's since been reported that Klopp will be heading for his second touchline ban of the season having already paid a £30,000 fine for berating fourth official Gary Beswick for failing to award a free-kick on Mohamed Salah by Bernardo Silva in the 1-0 win over Manchester City on October 16.
The circumstances of the latest grievances are similar with the German once more annoyed by a call not to blow for a foul on Salah by Spurs' Ben Davies moments before the visitors won a free-kick that gave them a stoppage-time equaliser.
Liverpool fans, for their part, are steadfastly behind their manager and that he fights their corner with such passion and enthusiasm is just one of the many, many reasons he is revered on Merseyside.
But at a time when there is a nationwide attempt to limit the abuse to officials at grassroots level and an adult amateur football league on Merseyside announced that the majority of their referees were opting out of officiating matches for the "foreseeable future" as recently as November, due to the "totally unacceptable behaviour from clubs" toward them, what is seen at the elite level is clearly trickling down the pyramid.
The 2021/22 campaign saw as many as 380 bans for players and coaches for attacking or threatening referees, while the trialing of body camera technology is being rolled out across amateur leagues in Liverpool, Middlesbrough, Essex, and Worcester in an attempt to deter the abuse aimed of those refereeing amateur matches.
Klopp is not the first manager to take officials to task and he was likely not even the first that weekend in the Premier League. The likes of Alex Ferguson, Arsene Wenger, Jose Mourinho - similarly high-profile managers in years gone by - all overstepped the mark and received sanctions of their own, while, more recently, Antonio Conte and Thomas Tuchel were fined during their respective periods at Spurs and Chelsea. Pep Guardiola was given a warning for his behaviour in early 2019 after a 2-1 victory over Liverpool.
With the stakes high and the blood running hot in the Premier League's pressure cooker, it is understandable the rags are lost and tempers boil, but in the wider lens, it's also an unedifying and undignified situation for Klopp and Liverpool to find themselves in, even if guns are being stuck to with regards to the long-running unease at Tierney taking his charge of their games.
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