Former Liverpool defender Dejan Lovren has revealed he wanted to leave the club in 2019 after feeling ‘no longer counted’ at the club.
Lovren spent six years at Anfield after a £22.77m move from Southampton in July 2014, going on to make 185 appearances for the club in total.
His time at the club was a successful one in terms of trophies, with the Croatian winning the Premier League, Champions League and UEFA Supercup while he was there.
Lovren was not always key player for those successes, though, instead finding himself playing a bit-part role under Liverpool boss Jürgen Klopp, who preferred the likes of Virgil van Dijk, Joe Gomez and Joel Matip in the heart of his defence.
Indeed, it was their strength in depth that led Liverpool to accept a £10.8m offer from Zenit St Petersburg this summer, although Lovren says he was pushing for a move away earlier than that.
“We had some nice conversations in his office. It also got very loud, but always with respect,” he told German magazine Kicker, relayed by SportBILD.
“I had the feeling that I was no longer counted on in Liverpool. But I don’t want to be a substitute; I want to play football.
“Playing because others are injured – that’s exactly what I didn’t want anymore.
“I want to be important to a team, and that’s me here at Zenit.
“I actually wanted to leave in the summer of 2019, but that didn’t work out in the end. Fortunately, that’s how I left as a master.”
