When Loris Karius gave an interview to Ian Ladyman of the Daily Mail, he probably didn't know that his dismissal of Gary Neville's comments would ignite a war of words between pundits and managers.
And yet, Jurgen Klopp today took a pop at the Neville brothers and their supposed dislike of Liverpool earlier today. This came after Gary Neville took exception to Karius' comments, as well as a brief and ultimately friendly spat between Jamie Carragher and Didi Hamann on the subject.
The question now is whether or not Klopp is being too soft in defending Karius publicly, and when Chris Sutton was asked for his opinion on BBC Radio 5Live's Monday Night Club, he told of his experience with Martin O'Neill and how the current Ireland manager used to treat his 'keepers.
It’s about a manager working out whether to put an arm around a certain individual or to be tough on them.
Martin O’Neill, my old manager at Celtic, was always pretty tough on, well, not just goalkeepers, he didn’t just keep it for the goalkeepers. But he used to batter Rab Douglas and Jonathan Gould at half-time. Quite rightly, most of the time!
And I used to wonder how they went out and played in the second-half. That was his style.
If someone as thick-skinned as Sutton couldn't understand how his teammates could continue after their half-time dressing down, then you know it was serious.
Of course, it is difficult to find any of his former or current players with a bad word to say about Martin O'Neill, so clearly he knows when to pick his moments.
Darren Randolph made a high-profile mistake against Liverpool on Sunday, but followed it with a world-class save that stopped a certain goal and was then praised for his reaction to the error, in which he assumed full responsibility and claimed the save made no difference to him as he had cost his team a goal.
In contrast, Karius took Neville's criticism as an excuse to take a jab at his time with Valencia, which is how this whole talking point blew up. It's just as well he doesn't qualify for Ireland, because from the sounds of things he wouldn't enjoy playing under O'Neill.
[via TalkingBaws.com]
