Jurgen Klopp may be without the services of Christian Benteke, captain Jordan Henderson and Roberto Firmino when he takes charge of the Reds for the first time when they square off against Tottenham Hotspur at the weekend, but he won’t have to do it without his assistant manager after Zeljko Buvac was granted a work permit earlier this week.
Klopp, who took over at Anfield after the board dismissed struggling boss Brendan Rodgers following the draw with Everton, has been training with a reduced squad for much of the week with a large portion of the first team away representing their countries during the international break. With only a few days left to prepare, the German will be happy to not only have he bulk of squad back at Melwood after the final round of qualifiers for Euro-2016 finished up on Tuesday, but to finally have Buvac back in his coaching set up.
Reports in the media say that the Bosnian coach has been granted a UK visa and was reportedly on Merseyside in time to participate in first team training today as the Reds prepare for Saturday’s trip to White Hart Lane.
With Rodgers out the door, much of coaching staff followed suit with assistant manager Sean O’Driscoll, Chris Davies, head of opposition analysis, Glen Driscoll, head of performance, and Gary McAllister, first-team coach, losing their jobs as well. Only first team development coach Pepijn Lijnders survived the purge and he’ll be in good company with Buvac, who worked with Klopp at both Borussia Dortmund and Mainz 05, as well as Peter Krawietz, another long term member of his back-room set-up and described by the German as “the Eye”, set to oversee training at Melwood.
