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Tom Werner admits that owners Fenway Sports Group had long since coveted Jurgen Klopp prior to his appointment as Liverpool manager.

The Reds chairman flew in from Boston for Klopp’s unveiling and is convinced the former Borussia Dortmund boss will transform the club’s fortunes.

Werner refused to be drawn on when FSG first made an approach to the 48-year-old coach. However, it’s no secret that they wanted him following the sackings of previous managers Roy Hodgson and Kenny Dalglish.

On both occasions Klopp informed them he was fully committed to Dortmund but after his recent four-month break from football he jumped at the chance to succeed Brendan Rodgers.

Asked about the short four-day gap between sacking Rodgers and confirmation of Klopp as his successor, Werner said: “We have learned to keep certain matters confidential.

“We had a meeting recently with Jurgen that he has talked about and I don’t want to talk too much about these conversations.

“But we have thought about him for a long time and everyone who knows football knows he is an outstanding manager.

We all expect the players to respond to him

“Obviously, he motivates players and when we spoke to him we saw there was a great connection between his vision and what we want to do moving forward.

“It is very attractive football, attacking football. He has said that he doesn’t want to put too much expectation on the near future but we all expect the players are going to respond to him.”

The appointment of Klopp marks a move away from FSG’s model of having a young up and coming coach.

The owners opted to keep faith with Rodgers after a woeful end to last season but their patience ran out after seeing Liverpool start the current campaign in similarly sluggish fashion.

Klopp inherits a team who sit 10th in the Premier League with 12 points from eight matches.

Brendan is an outstanding manager but we decided to move in a different direction

“We gave Brendan as you know an opportunity to see if we could improve this season,” Werner said.

“There was some very good football last season and some not so good football.

“There were some challenges with injuries. We brought in some new players that Brendan recommended that we thought would take us forward.

“We are where we are. I don’t want to say too much, Brendan is an outstanding manager but we decided to move in a different direction and I am very optimistic.

“I thought Brendan’s comments at the end were very classy and we have a lot of respect for Brendan.

“When we appointed Brendan we thought he was going to be the right manager for Liverpool. Obviously we now feel that we have got a world class manager and beyond that there is not much more I would like to say.

“Obviously, we have a challenge this season and Jurgen said it right. None of the supporters are satisfied with our position right now and we believe that Jurgen is the right manager to take us forward.

“We came into this situation with great ambition and I would rather focus right now on the future.”

Next weeks marks the fifth anniversary of FSG’s takeover of Liverpool. Financially, the Reds are in a much stronger position and the redevelopment of Anfield is now well advanced, but on the field the success they targeted has eluded them.

Liverpool have won just one League Cup in that period and have only qualified for the Champions League once.

FSG have already sacked three managers but Werner believes that in Klopp they have the right man at the helm to ensure they kick on.

“We have obviously had some great moments in these five years,” Werner said.

“We came very close to winning the league two years ago. Nobody is satisfied with our position and as owners we are not going to put undue pressure on Jurgen.

“He knows that there are great expectations and when we look at the time line I think we have made some improvements.

“We all know the challenge that we saw when we came into the club five years ago and I think we are proud when we walked into the stadium today and we showed Jurgen the new main stand that is being constructed. But until we win more trophies we won’t be satisfied.

“Our track record is to encourage stability. There have been more managers here than we hoped but I hope that Jurgen will be here for a very long time."