What will Jürgen Klopp wear on the touchline as Germany's new head coach? The new DFB boss dropped a subtle hint. Our photo series traces Klopp's style transformation across his career.
Squad questions, targets, the usual script of a managerial unveiling. Then a journalist in Frankfurt wants to know: Will the new Germany head coach stand on the touchline in a tracksuit or a suit? Klopp grins. „Definitely no tie.“ He adds at his unveiling that he's had the chance to re-dress himself in recent years, and that it suits the new job better than his old style ever did.
Re-dressing himself. Coming from Klopp, that's a new tune. This was once the man who told the Guardian, in essence, that he simply never thought about how he looks. Our photo series shows what lies between those two sentences.
From Mainz player to promotion-winning coach: Jürgen Klopp's early years
2002, a photo shoot in Mainz. Klopp wears a leather jacket, a check shirt, and oval glasses. Shortly before, he had still been a player, then Mainz 05 made him head coach practically overnight, and there's a picture of that in this series too.
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By May 2004, that coach had taken Mainz to the Bundesliga for the first time. In the photo from the promotion party, a cigar hangs from the corner of his mouth. This was a man with bigger concerns than clothes.
Pöhler cap and Champions League suit: Jürgen Klopp's Dortmund years
In Dortmund, things started appearing that would become associated with Klopp: a grey Stone Island rollneck at the team photo shoot, the „Pöhler“ cap, named after a slang word for street footballer from the Ruhr area, Germany's industrial heartland, and the Ray-Ban Clubmasters.
Over time, a contrast emerged: For Champions League nights, Klopp increasingly swapped the training gear for a suit. The Pöhler from the touchline could do formal too.
Cap, beard and glasses: Jürgen Klopp's Liverpool years
For his Liverpool unveiling in 2015, Klopp appeared in a blazer. In the years that followed, Oakley glasses and an ever-greyer beard defined his face, the cap came and went. At some point, the British press started writing about the „Silver Fox“. At the title celebrations, he showed his most laid-back side: cap worn backwards, glasses on, and a gleaming white smile.
That smile has a story of its own: Since late 2017, Klopp has sported strikingly flawless teeth, experts suspect veneers or crowns, though he himself has never confirmed it. In 2021, he also had his eyes treated, a minor procedure, as he stressed, not laser surgery. He barely needed his glasses after that.
The new Klopp: From the Formula 1 paddock to the DFB unveiling
The final pictures show what came next. At a Formula 1 race in Spielberg: all black, with sunglasses and a Red Bull cap from his employer at the time. As a World Cup pundit this summer: sometimes a light jacket, sometimes a black blazer, everything a notch calmer than before. At his DFB unveiling, he continued that simple look with black trousers and a black T-shirt.
What he'll wear on the touchline as Germany head coach, Klopp left open. Only one thing is certain, and it's what he won't wear: a tie.
