"New territory for him": Klopp officially starts in new role

Jürgen Klopp's long-time companion and friend Christian Heidel has ruled out his comeback as coach shortly before his official introduction as global head of soccer at Red Bull. "As things stand today, I can hardly imagine it. But of course it will also depend on how he experiences this new role, how he feels about it," the FSV Mainz 05 sports director told RTL. If Klopp has the feeling in "two years' time: I have to get back on the bench. Then he will."

On Tuesday afternoon (2.00 pm), Klopp will be presented in Salzburg as the new Head of Global Soccer of the beverage company with clubs in Leipzig, Salzburg, New York, Brazil and Japan. After the first few days of getting to know each other, the 57-year-old will travel to the RB locations. There are expressly no plans for him to work as a coach.

Criticism only in Germany

Heidel is eager to see how Klopp gets on in his new role. "This is new territory for him too. He made the decision to no longer act as a coach on the sidelines, but he simply wanted to stay connected to soccer," said the manager. What Red Bull do, they do very, very well. "And I'm afraid that it will now be even better overall if Jürgen Klopp brings his experience to the table."

Klopp had expected the criticism of the move to the group. "He told me that the only country where there was this response was Germany," said Heidel. He could deal with that.