"Idiots! Rubbish! No clue at all!" Jürgen Klopp is absolutely livid following sensational rumours

The long-serving, successful manager of Borussia Dortmund and Liverpool FC has repeatedly been linked with the role of Germany national team manager in the past. And time and again, he has denied the speculation. Since early 2025, Klopp has been working as Global Sports Director for Red Bull, which has numerous branches, including in Salzburg and Leipzig. He is under contract until 2029, whilst Julian Nagelsmann’s contract as national team manager with the DFB runs until 2028.

Klopp said he could even “somewhat understand” the constant questions about a possible future as Germany’s national team manager – but he clearly sees things very differently when it comes to rumours of an imminent departure from Red Bull and a possible move to Real Madrid.

“It’s good that we’re talking about this,” Klopp began, launching into a mixture of a principled and angry tirade. “When is a story a story? When someone takes a sheet of paper and writes something on it? Or when there’s actually something to it? What does the situation have to be? That Real Madrid called me at some point and said: ‘Florentino Pérez on the phone! Jürgen, how are things?' Or is it enough if OE24 – no idea whether that’s AI or written by people – writes some rubbish? That annoys me."

The background: Following Xabi Alonso’s departure at the start of the year, Klopp was touted as a potential successor at Real. This was reported by Sky and the renowned Spanish journalist Guillem Balague, among others. OE24, on the other hand, is a consistently sensationalist online platform from Austria that picked up on these reports and spread them further. Why Klopp mentioned OE24 of all places remained unclear.

Addressing the reporters present on Monday, Klopp said: "You need to show a bit of discipline there. It’s all just nonsense." Real had "not called him once, not a single time" in the course of his life so far. He added mockingly: "I’ll take over at Atlético Madrid as well, preferably at the same time. Sorry Madrid, you’ll have to ring first!"

Having dealt with the DFB and Real Madrid, Klopp was finally asked about the rumour of an imminent departure from Red Bull. “The same idiots wrote that: the *Salzburger Nachrichten*,” replied Klopp, now visibly furious. “The reporter from the *Salzburger Nachrichten* hasn’t got a clue. And everyone’s jumping on the bandwagon there too.”

The rumour about Klopp leaving Red Bull had indeed been spread by the Salzburger Nachrichten at the end of February. However, the newspaper has nothing to do with the online portal OE24 – quite the opposite, in fact. The Salzburger Nachrichten is a renowned quality publication – one that also has a controversial history with Klopp.

In June 2024, the Salzburger Nachrichten was the first media outlet to report on Klopp’s imminent move to Red Bull. Klopp’s agent, Marc Kosicke, dismissed the rumour at the time as “complete nonsense” – but in October, Klopp did indeed sign for Red Bull.