Part of Jurgen Klopp’s charm lies in his capacity for left-field thought and his ability to conjure a unique phrase.
Liverpool were synonymous with the Uefa Champions League in the days when it was still the European Cup, yet while Pep Guardiola likes to reference Manchester City’s comparative lack of history in continental competitions, the reality is Liverpool are in their first quarter-final for nine years and have not reached the last four for a decade.
“You can ask yourself if the experience of your grandfather helps you in your life,” said Klopp, who is both showman and entertainer and the catalyst for Liverpool’s rebirth in Europe and their transformation into high-paced attackers
Most of the heroes of Liverpool’s glory nights are in their fifties and sixties now. Tommy Smith, a scorer in the 1977 final, turned 73 last week. A successor, though not a biological descendant, Trent Alexander-Arnold, will be charged with halting Leroy Sane for the second time in a week. He is still a teenager for another six months.
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Klopp found a roundabout way of saying it, but Liverpool are in uncharted territory; as a group and as any team facing City this season.
“Defending a 3-0 lead is going to be a bit of a strange situation,” said Virgil van Dijk, who will anchor that defence. Liverpool’s answer feels entirely typical: attack.
“We need to come here with the mindset that it is still 0-0 and we want to win the game and we know we are capable of scoring goals,” added Van Dijk.
The question of expectation is a constant. “It is common sense to say when we play in the Champions League against the winner of the Premier League that you are not the favourite,” said Klopp, fully aware his side started the tie as underdogs. He is aware the most anticipated outcome on Tuesday night is that Liverpool lose the game but progress on aggregate.
A man whose brand of football can cause opponents chaos is all too aware of the sport’s unpredictability. Unprompted, he mentioned that his side conceded five goals at the Etihad Stadium in September. He highlighted, too, the first half of City’s 3-2 defeat to Manchester United on Saturday.
“Against one of the best teams in the world, they could have scored six goals and maybe should have four at least,” he said.
More goals seem on the agenda on Tuesday night. Three meetings of Liverpool and City this season have produced 15. Between them, they have scored 242 times: Guardiola’s side, with 126, are 10 ahead of Klopp’s charges, but Liverpool are the Champions League’s top scorers.
And yet the overlooked statistic is that Liverpool have six clean sheets in their last seven European games. “We defended very well in the second half [last week],” Van Dijk said.
Liverpool are striking a delicate balance, guarding against complacency, respecting City and yet stressing their own attributes. Klopp described City as the planet’s finest team and Guardiola as its outstanding manager, yet he also said: “There is no perfect football team in the world.”
Perfection, he argued, is unattainable as he outlined with exaggeration when asked to define his perfect scenario: “If we score five, it will be difficult for Manchester [City].”
“They have so much quality,” said Van Dijk. Tellingly, though, when asked if he felt City were vulnerable, he argued he already sensed that after Liverpool inflicted their first Premier League defeat in January. “We are full of confidence anyway,” said the Dutchman.
It is an attitude Liverpool will bring whether or not Mohamed Salah, whose groin injury ended his participation in the first leg, is passed fit. The Egyptian trained on Sunday, but a decision will be made on Tuesday.
Not that Klopp appeared too worried by the potential absence of a 38-goal forward who has struck in his last two games against City and troubled a host of left-backs. He was asked instead about Roberto Firmino, who feels he is in the finest form of his career.
Klopp’s comic timing came to the fore as he was asked if he agreed. Klopp paused, weighed up an answer and simply said: “Yes.” Did he want to elaborate, came the response. He grinned, considered and responded: “No.”
U19 World Cup in South Africa
Group A: India, Japan, New Zealand, Sri Lanka
Group B: Australia, England, Nigeria, West Indies
Group C: Bangladesh, Pakistan, Scotland, Zimbabwe
Group D: Afghanistan, Canada, South Africa, UAE
UAE fixtures
Saturday, January 18, v Canada
Wednesday, January 22, v Afghanistan
Saturday, January 25, v South Africa
UAE squad
Aryan Lakra (captain), Vriitya Aravind, Deshan Chethyia, Mohammed Farazuddin, Jonathan Figy, Osama Hassan, Karthik Meiyappan, Rishabh Mukherjee, Ali Naseer, Wasi Shah, Alishan Sharafu, Sanchit Sharma, Kai Smith, Akasha Tahir, Ansh Tandon
The Bio
Favourite vegetable: “I really like the taste of the beetroot, the potatoes and the eggplant we are producing.”
Holiday destination: “I like Paris very much, it’s a city very close to my heart.”
Book: “Das Kapital, by Karl Marx. I am not a communist, but there are a lot of lessons for the capitalist system, if you let it get out of control, and humanity.”
Musician: “I like very much Fairuz, the Lebanese singer, and the other is Umm Kulthum. Fairuz is for listening to in the morning, Umm Kulthum for the night.”
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
MATCH INFO
Uefa Champions League, last-16, second leg (first-leg scores in brackets):
PSG (2) v Manchester United (0)
Midnight (Thursday), BeIN Sports
Company Fact Box
Company name/date started: Abwaab Technologies / September 2019
Founders: Hamdi Tabbaa, co-founder and CEO. Hussein Alsarabi, co-founder and CTO
Based: Amman, Jordan
Sector: Education Technology
Size (employees/revenue): Total team size: 65. Full-time employees: 25. Revenue undisclosed
Stage: early-stage startup
Investors: Adam Tech Ventures, Endure Capital, Equitrust, the World Bank-backed Innovative Startups SMEs Fund, a London investment fund, a number of former and current executives from Uber and Netflix, among others.
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
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Formula Middle East Calendar (Formula Regional and Formula 4)
Round 1: January 17-19, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 2: January 22-23, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 3: February 7-9, Dubai Autodrome – Dubai
Round 4: February 14-16, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 5: February 25-27, Jeddah Corniche Circuit – Saudi Arabia
