Liverpool will play Bayern Munich this summer in Singapore, as Jurgen Klopp demands that this pre-season “must be different.”
Klopp has acknowledged the failings of last pre-season, playing their first friendlies in Asia, including a 4-0 defeat to Man United.
Quite why or how it was decided not to have any local friendlies against local lower-league opposition such as Tranmere or Chester, as is the norm, has never quite been explained.
But plans for this coming summer are now becoming clearer – although, again there will be no local games.
Liverpool’s players will return for training on July 8 then head to Germany the following week for a training camp in Donaueschingen in the Black Forest – where Klopp grew up.
There, they are in talks to play Karlsruher SC in a game that will open the 2. Bundesliga club’s new 34,000-seater stadium, Wildparkstadion.
That match is pencilled in for July 19, but has yet to be confirmed.
From Germany, the Reds will head to Asia for a mini-tournament in Singapore where they will face Bayern Munich and one of either Roma or Tottenham.
The match against Bayern will, of course, mean a reunion with Sadio Mane – providing the attacker hasn’t been sold by his new club by then!
Last summer also saw Liverpool play in Singapore, but Klopp insists this year will be different.
“It was never a perfect pre-season,” he said. “But it’s not the reason for our season now. This year must be different.
“We have to step up. And we have to prepare that in the pre-season and that’s why I want them back together as quick as somehow possible, respecting the necessity of holidays.
“I know that and I respect that and I want them to go on holiday for as long as possible but for this year we have to make sure we are together as soon as possible and can go from there.”
The new Premier League season begins on August 12. Liverpool are expected to play the first game away from home in order to allow more time for the finalising of the newly expanded Anfield Road Stand.
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