Jurgen
Klopp remembers the first time he saw a Thomas Tuchel team. It was 2009 and
the final of the U19 competition in Germany. Tuchel's Mainz were up against
Borussia Dortmund. Klopp watched with Christian Heidel, his old sporting
director.
"It was my former club against my actual club," Klopp tells Sky Sports.
"Andres Schurrle was in the Mainz team. Mario Gotze was the most famous name
in the Dortmund side. I would have watched this game anyway because it was
just a great season for both teams.
"The rest is maybe a nice story."
Mainz won the match and Tuchel won an admirer. Klopp turned to Heidel
afterwards and declared that while Dortmund had the better players, Mainz
had the better team. That summer, Heidel acted quickly to appoint Tuchel as
the club's new first-team coach.
"He won the final and then a few weeks later he was the manager of the first
team and did an exceptional job," recalls Klopp. Tuchel took Mainz to a
top-half finish in his first season and briefly topped the Bundesliga in his
second. Klopp had a unique insight throughout.
"That he is very good, I knew, because Christian Heidel would tell me pretty
much every minute. We were still in close contact and I was still concerned
about the well-being of my former club because it is my home club. I was
really happy to see how well they did."
Klopp was doing even better, overhauling Dortmund to win the first of
back-to-back Bundesliga titles in 2011. "We had some meetings with different
results," he says, modestly. But Tuchel's rise continued and he graduated to
succeed Klopp at Dortmund in 2015.
Now, these two men who began their senior coaching careers at Mainz, are not
only Premier League opponents but account for two of the last three
Champions League-winning teams - their wins sandwiched by that of compatriot
Hansi Flick at Bayern Munich.
German coaching is at the vanguard.
Klopp and Tuchel are examples of that, but they have also helped to shape
it. Klopp has been an example with his playing style, the gegenpressing that
captured the imagination of Europe a decade ago. But Tuchel too has been an
influence in his own way.
His journey from the academy has become a symbol for other German coaches.
He is the forerunner to Julian Nagelsmann and the rest. The brand of
football itself has similar roots to that of his Mainz predecessor Klopp but
it has evolved a little differently.
"It is difficult to judge a manager or a coach who you have never worked
with," Klopp explains. "You can only do it by watching his teams play. With
him, the ideas behind his match plans are always obvious, which I think is
important.
"It is a footballing philosophy, it is a possession philosophy, but he is
not stubborn or anything. It is flexible from a technical point of view at
the highest level. He adapts to different situations. He adapted especially
when he came from Mainz to Dortmund.
"I had the same challenge to face, incidentally. Suddenly, you have a
completely different quality of player to work with and you have to deal
with that. Then when you go to PSG that is another step and how he dealt
with that I thought was really impressive.
"This is a really good coach from an interesting generation in Germany,
actually."
Tuchel's swift success helped to create that pathway for others.
It highlighted the latent potential within clubs' own academies and a
generation of German coaches have emerged as a result.
Tayfun Korkut, a Turkey international who has had four Bundesliga jobs since
starting out in academies himself, recognises Tuchel's influence. "He was
the start of the pushing of academy coaches," Korkut tells Sky Sports.
"Before Thomas, clubs would just bring in experienced managers. This was the
start of clubs looking to the coaches in their academies because he was
successful right from the start.
"He was so well prepared."
That level of preparation can partly be explained by the thorough coaching
background provided by the esteemed DFB coaching academy at Hennef. Tuchel
completed his badges in 2006 but the legacy continues. Three of the four
coaches in the semi-finals of last year's Champions League studied at
Hennef, Nagelsmann graduating with top marks in 2014.
Perhaps it is best left to an outsider to explain what Hennef does
differently. Stuttgart's American head coach Pellegrino Matarazzo has a
unique perspective on the stringent demands placed on coaches there. He
roomed with Nagelsmann during their studies.
"To evaluate 10 months in Hennef would be difficult in two or three
sentences," Matarazzo tells Sky Sports. "You are there three or four days a
week with 23 other guys who are very ambitious coaches. If there are gaps in
your repertoire, they are soon filled in that time.
"You just think about soccer 24/7, investing a lot of energy into it. It was
a very intense time, especially if you have a team to coach at the weekend
too. The creative thoughts come after those 10 months when things settle in
and you have time to think about it all."
"I think the licences played their part but I think the bigger reason for
the explosion in coaches here in Germany is due to the situation in the
academies," he explains. "Just getting curious and hungry young coaches in
one room being creative and productive.
"Of course, the licencing process in Germany is very good and very
structured. I think I gathered knowledge that was very valuable. In Hennef,
having a group of guys putting their heads together, planted seeds that can
flourish at a later time.
"But I think there is just a wave of German coaches now getting the
opportunities. Success stories like Julian Nagelsmann and Domenico Tedesco
showed they were ready at Bundesliga level, performed, and so more young
coaches are getting the opportunity.
"You could sense it here in Germany, a certain enthusiasm developing, a
hope. You might call it a hope among young coaches in Germany to become
Bundesliga coaches. They started gearing up their thought processes, being
more ambitious in their goals.
"That is why I think it is more the academy work than the licensing process.
Young coaches are coming through those academies rather than going through
the regional leagues or the men's leagues but coming out of the academies.
The hope is fuelling the ambition.
"Clubs see it as a fresh coach with new ideas and that is good for the team.
Whether that coach is able to stay in position for three or four years, that
is another story, but coaches are getting the opportunity now. Fresh,
hungry, new ideas. It seems to be working."
The impact is being felt beyond the Bundesliga. It is there in the Premier
League where Klopp's Liverpool faced Norwich on the opening weekend, coached
by former Dortmund U19 coach Daniel Farke. On Saturday, it is Liverpool
versus Chelsea.
Klopp versus Tuchel.
It is a dozen years since that U19 game between Mainz and Dortmund. Tuchel
is now a Champions League winner, lifting the trophy after only 30 games in
charge of Chelsea.
Klopp had long been expecting him.
"With the CV of Thomas, it was clear that he would end up in England at one
point because he is obviously an exceptional coach," he says, reflecting on
Tuchel's journey.
"Whatever he has done so far has been absolutely sensational, I have to say.
At Mainz, he was successful. At Dortmund, he was successful. At PSG, he was
massively successful. So, yeah, he did not choose the easy way but here he
is at a top club in England."
As Klopp says of the men made in Mainz, the rest is a nice story.
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