Pepijn Lijnders has a big role as assistant manager to Jurgen Klopp at Liverpool.
He returned to Anfield in June 2018, having left Merseyside for a brief period to take the managerial job at NEC. Things didn’t go well back in the Netherlands, and Lijnders was shown the door at NEC after failing to secure promotion.
Since his return to Liverpool, the 39-year-old has been part of the coaching team which has helped the Reds win the Champions League and Premier League, and enjoy the most successful period in the club’s recent history.
On occasion, for various reasons, he’s even taken press conferences and managed the side, and Klopp is clearly keen on his assistant.
However, De Telegraaf’s Wim Kieft, a legend of Dutch football, thinks Lijnders is too keen on himself.
In a column for the newspaper’s Saturday edition, titled ‘Lijnders does not know his place’, Kieft takes issue with a recent Dutch TV interview the coach gave.
Not only does Kieft think Lijnders is trying to take too much credit away from Klopp, he also believes disrespect was shown to Liverpool during the interview.
The column explains: ‘By the way, for those who didn’t know yet: Pepijn Lijnders, together with Jurgen Klopp, is the founder of the success of Liverpool. At least, according to Lijnders himself. During an interview for Dutch television, Klopp’s assistant caused curled toes by continuously talking about ‘Jurgen and I’. He only talked about the great cooperation, the openness of their relationship and the trust that had developed from that. An ostentatious attempt to take credit for himself or at least take some of the credit for Liverpool’s achievements.
‘Whoever works as an assistant to Klopp; Liverpool’s success is Klopp’s success. He experiences the pressure as Liverpool’s head coach every day. The assistant is not under pressure. For him it is easy to dance on the table and be part of a successful group 
without being held responsible for its success. Lijnders should sometimes rub that under his nose.
‘It should be noted that Klopp and Lijnders are not, as Lijnders pretended, the ones who have put Liverpool on the map. Before their arrival in 2015, this great glorious and successful English club had already won numerous awards nationally and internationally, Liverpool had already been the best in Europe five times.’
Wim Kieft clearly believes that Pepijn Lijnders needs to get his feet back on the ground, and it’s a near certainty that this smackdown in De Telegraaf will find its way to the eyes or ears of the Liverpool assistant.
