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Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp knew exactly what he would be asked in his first press conference after it had been revealed that the club had pulled out of the race to sign Jude Bellingham. "What you want to know is, as I sit here, am I angry with our owners (Fenway Sports Group) that we can’t do this or that? No I am not. I am not," the German insisted back in April.
"I don’t agree all the time with everything we do, but I am employed here. I am not here to be angry about things that will work out or not work out. The way we did things in the past is the way we will do it in the future, that is the way."
However, while Klopp may not have been angry, the fans were furious. Former Liverpool defender Jamie Carragher spoke for many of his fellow Scousers when he said that "after a year working on a deal, it feels like a timid surrender to step aside and allow Manchester City and Real Madrid to fight it out."
"Liverpool and Jurgen Klopp built a level of trust with regards to transfers which was the envy of Europe," Carragher wrote in The Telegraph. "That trust has gone with news they will not be pursuing Jude Bellingham this summer. Everything pointed to waiting for Bellingham. The supporters were sold the dream that the next Steven Gerrard was Anfield-bound."
He added: "There are times when a club of Liverpool's stature has to flex some muscle and remind their rivals they can and will be there to compete off and on the pitch. To walk away because there is now too much work needed across the whole squad smacks of weakness, negligence and poor planning."