Gary Neville shares what has shocked him about Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp

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Sky Sports pundit Gary Neville has admitted to being “shocked” about how efficiently Jurgen Klopp has put together the current Liverpool side, culminating in two big-money signings as the final pieces of the jigsaw.

Liverpool are on the brink of the Premier League title, their first English top-flight championship for 30 years, and are also the reigning Champions League holders as well as Club World Cup victors.

While the team is full of quality throughout the pitch, two of Liverpool’s standout players are at the back – Virgil van Dijk, who joined in January 2018 for £75million, and Alisson Becker, who arrived a few months later for £66.8million – both record fees for players in those positions at the time.

Neville, sitting alongside Liverpool legend Jamie Carragher on Sky Sports’ Monday Night Football Retro, claimed that, for the 15 years or so prior to the arrivals of Van Dijk and Alisson, the Reds were always spending lower sums than their rivals on players.

As a result, that is why he was so surprised when almost £150million was spent on two players two years ago, at which point, the whole team suddenly became the finished product.

“It always felt like you (Liverpool) were toying with it in the transfer market,” Neville told Carragher on Sky Sports, as quoted by FourFourTwo. “If the market was at £13m, £15m, Liverpool were at £8m. If the market was at £25m, you were sort of at £16m. You were never quite up there.

“I think that’s what’s shocked me in the last few years about what Jurgen Klopp’s done. Because up until the point where he went for Alisson and Van Dijk, Liverpool still weren’t going to the levels of the other clubs.

“The other clubs were at £60m-70m, whereas Liverpool were at sort of £25m-30m, maybe getting to £35m.

“All of a sudden, you talk about the last piece of the jigsaw, and then all of a sudden Van Dijk happens and then Alisson happens and you think ‘Oh’. They were the last pieces of the jigsaw in essence.”

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It’s true how, for so many years, Liverpool appeared in the shadow of many of their Premier League peers, and while there have been world-class players at Anfield in the 1990s and 2000s, it’s hard to dispute that there was a world-class team.

Klopp has changed this, however, quietly putting together a team at relatively modest prices before really pushing the boat out in 2018, starting with Van Dijk and adding Alisson, Naby Keita and Fabinho in the summer.

But it’s not just about the money spent – Klopp is a coach of the highest calibre and has turned good players into great ones and great ones into world class ones, all part of one simply sensational team.