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For once, the locker room had been silent. The ride back to Kirkby had been silent, too. If the previous game had felt like a funeral, this one felt like reliving the funeral all over again. Worse yet, the wheels were coming off near the end of the last dance.
Despite the hugs at the end of the match, they all knew Klopp felt the same way they did: shocked, ashamed, and sombre. Of course, he wouldn’t want to talk, he had every right to be as morose as they were. Still, something in them longed for him to say something. To deliver a rousing team talk, confident and energising like a rush of hot air into a balloon; or a shouting match, where teacups flew as he pointed out where they should’ve been better, where they had to be better.
But ever since they’d arrived back at their home base, it had been total silence. Of the med staff, only the Powers remained in the building. Nemmer, after seeing the kids’ similarly glum expressions after the match, had taken them to a botanical garden with Kerry and the Rakotomalala-Khemsons. Buvac had taken Moneta to the veterinarian for her monthly checkup, leaving only the dour silence of everybody else.
“Look, tipos !” Bajcetic walked into the locker room, holding up a piece of paper. "I think you should see this."
“Look at the league table? No, thank you.” Alexander-Arnold pursed his lips, standing from his place between Robertson and Bradley. “We know that we’re third, we know that Arsenal are going to steamroll Villa and then they and City are going to have the most perfect run in history while the refs argue about which one to favour. We know that, Stefan. We know we could’ve had this in the bag.”
“Trentski.” Alisson sighed, impulsively pulling the Scouser into a hug. “We’re already feeling terrible, the last thing we need to do is fight. Maybe we should keep the peace right now…”
Robertson scoffed, shaking his hair out of his eyes. “Why should we? You and Virgil have had unresolved issues with each other since before the season. I’m still dealing with being the third wheel to Trent and Domi, and Darwin and Lucho have been trying to compete with each other on the pitch, among other things. I don't know what to do now, but sweeping everything under the rug isn't a solution.”
“But this is important.” Bajcetic passed the piece of paper to Van Dijk, sitting next to Thiago and leaning his head on his shoulder. “I think the boss left this for us.”
“Oh, finally.” Van Dijk unfolded the paper, sighing in relief when he saw Klossner’s unmistakable handwriting. “He’d better not do that again, or else he’ll worry the youngsters.”
Alisson raised an eyebrow at Van Dijk, although his anxiety about the situation was on clear display. “The youngsters, or you?”
Van Dijk didn’t respond, instead beginning to read the letter.
To my precious lieblings,
I know you’re all wondering why I haven’t come to talk with you since the match ended. To be honest with you, I was in no shape to give any sort of team talk without making things worse. So I got into bed and stayed there until Andreas reminded me of something important. That’s the first thing I want to tell you.
A month ago, the Weird Managers’ Club agreed to have a party on the day that Xabi Alonso’s team won the Bundesliga and Xabi specifically requested that I be there for the “changing of the guard”, since I was the last manager to win the Bundesliga with a team that wasn’t Bayern. And that day happens to be today. I have to attend to keep my promise to Xabi, and Pep needs to start getting used to being a full-time manager in the WMC. So, Pep and I will unfortunately be out the rest of the day and night. Virgil, and Zel when he comes back, are in charge until I return tomorrow morning, but don’t be afraid to call me in case of an emergency.
Everybody else breathed a collective sigh of relief as they realised that Klopp wasn’t ignoring them because he was mad at them. Klopp wasn’t often angry with his players, but the few times he had been were enough to send shivers down their spines.
“Wait a minute! The boss said that was the first thing he wanted to tell us,” Quansah pointed out. He tried to look over Van Dijk’s shoulder at the letter. “What was the next one?”
“Patience, Jarell.” Van Dijk brushed Quansah aside, continuing to read the letter.
Okay, that’s solved. Here’s the second thing.
I love you all so much. None of you deserved to go through any of what you did. Criticism is okay, and reality checks are more than okay, but hate and external suffering are not okay.
I love you. And I've failed you all. I wasn't enough for what you deserved. You deserved the world, and I barely brought you the backyard. The past eight days have been eight days of self-inflicted hell. The "self-inflicted" part is the worst because this could've been avoided.
I didn't know what to do, or when to do it, or how to do it differently. I've always been stubborn, a creature of habit. This time, it was to our demise. I thought doing the same thing I'd always done would bring the same results, as long as I didn't deviate too much. But the same old thing never works, does it? I wish it did. It never has.
I thought that honesty, being ourselves, self-belief, and love were the ways that we could win something, but they weren't. Honesty gets us cheated by the system, being ourselves gets us hated by the system and a lot of the country. Our self-belief has been lost because I couldn't maintain it, and all we have is our love for each other now. But love, while it's important, can't save the day every day. We need to do the other things, or else our love will just be in vain.
I've got to be honest with you, mein Jungen. I've carried a lot on my heart since I started playing, but somehow I managed to find joy. Somehow. I think the inflection point was in January 2021, when my mother passed away. Something in me broke then, something fundamental, and I've never been the same since then. If it wasn't for you, though, I would be far worse. You, the kids, the staff. Everybody here, in their ways and times, has given me strength beyond what I would've had without you all. I will always be grateful for that, even when I'm an old man with nothing but his scrapbooks.
Tonight, I want you all to go to bed and think about what this team means to you. Think about our history, our memories, our trials and tribulations. And yeah, think about our love, too.
I have failed all of you beyond words, and I am infinitely sorry. But we still have time left together. I've run out of energy. But maybe you can find some, and bring yourselves and the fans some much-needed sunshine.
Much love and gratefulness,
Your boss
Van Dijk looked up from the letter, trying to blink back the tears. “I can’t believe it. He thinks he failed us.”
Alisson was in a far worse state than Van Dijk. He had been holding back his emotions ever since the fifth paragraph, and the ending had absolutely broken him. Tears streamed down his face as he tightly hugged a similarly distraught Endo. "He didn't fail us, we failed him. We didn’t want to, but…”
“Nobody wanted to fail him, la’.” Jones shook his head, staring down at the floor. “He did so much for all of us, and we couldn’t return the favour. Yeah, he properly forked it up a bunch o’ times, but he always wants the best for us.”
Nunez gripped Mac Allister’s hand, sniffing heavily. “Si tan solo hubiera anotado esos tiros de antes...”
“It’s not just you, Wino. Everybody here, except the keepers, missed chances.” For once, Szoboszlai’s saucy, bold demeanour had faded to something close to reverence. “Us midfielders could’ve done better at holding and distributing the ball.”
Kwanza gazed at Kelleher with a meaningful look. “And us defenders could’ve not made every ninety minutes into a living hell for you keepers.”
"Face it, guys." Apart from Van Dijk, Adrian was the only one in the group who wasn't hugging or holding onto someone. “We all failed him, every one of us. We win as a team, we lose as a team. And we failed as a team.”
"But we still have a chance to make things right, right?" Danns spoke up, breaking the heavy silence in the room. "We have a chance to turn things around and make the boss proud again."
“What chance, Jayden? In case you didn’t know, we’re two points behind City.” Van Dijk spoke for the first time since he’d finished reading the letter, slumping onto the bench next to Gomez. “The whole tradition of the league is that City go on this suspiciously repetitive unbeaten run at the end of the season, magnified by the fact that they play all the least likely teams to beat them at that same time. If they even drop points between now and the end of the season, then it’s a miracle.”
“But miracles can happen!” Danns protested, crossing his arms and standing in the centre of the locker room. “Some of you were there for the Miracle of Anfield in 2019, others were here for the Wembley Miracle a month and a half ago! Corner taken quickly? That was you, Trent! The Villa Mentality Monsters? Robbo, you scored and assisted in getting us there! Ali, without your header we might’ve not made top-4 in 2021! Don’t forget how many times your last-minute goals saved us this year, Darwin. Caoimh, you kept a clean sheet in the cup, and then Virg scored the winning goal at the last minute with a bunch of kids—including Trey, of all people!”
Nyoni bristled, standing up from his seat. “HEY, WHAT THE—”
“Never mind that! The point is, we still have a lot of miracles in us.” Danns slammed his fist against the wall, looking around the room determinedly. “The boss never gave up on us when we needed it the most, why should we give up on him now?”
“You said it, bro!” Kwanza jumped up from the bench and pumped his fist in the air. "Let’s do this! If we can’t succeed, let’s fail in the best way possible!"
The rest of the team nodded in agreement, feeling a renewed sense of hope.
Robertson stood up and climbed onto Alexander-Arnold’s shoulders, clapping his hands together. "Let’s go, mates!"
As they left the locker room, feeling far better than they had before, they noticed a small envelope on the table outside the room. Van Dijk picked it up and opened it, revealing another small note.
P.S.: I left something for you in the kitchen.☺. We played like a B-tech Millwall today, but that doesn’t mean you don’t deserve some cheering up.