Liverpool’s four-year Premier League run gives Jürgen Klopp a good result against Watford

The phrase “new manager rebound” has long been enough to turn optimists into pessimists.

Giving up the old one and getting into the new, despite the lack of new signings and a few days to work with the same players who cost the old manager their job, has long resulted in the fear of facing teams that have just come from. change high, where the improvement in confidence, the desire to impress the new manager and the feeling of being rid of the shackles often caused frowning results.

This weekend, Liverpool will face a team from Watford under new management.

Last week Claudio Ranieri, the man who led Leicester City to English league football’s greatest achievement in 2016, when the Foxes defied the odds of 5,000-1 to take home the biggest prize in English football, has been given the reins of Vicarage Road, the revolving door of the Hertfordshire club managers continue after Xisco Muñoz has paid the price for the Hornets’ poor start to the season.

Watford fans are hoping the new manager’s rebound will work in their favor at Anfield on Saturday, but against Jürgen Klopp’s Liverpool they will face a side that have a strong recent record for a miserable first game in the dugout for the opposing managers. .

In fact, Ranieri was indirectly involved the last time the Reds did not condemn a new manager to defeat in his Premier League opener.

Ranieri was controversially sacked at Leicester in 2017, less than 12 months after leading the Foxes to their greatest triumph of all time. Since then, the wandering man in European football management has charmed with Nantes, Fulham, Roma and Sampdoria, now returning to the Premier League with Watford.

But it was his successor at Leicester, Craig Shakespeare, who was the last manager to beat the Reds in his first game in charge.

Liverpool were the first opponents of Shakespeare’s reign of King Power, which was to become a permanent affair of short duration. Much of football was dismayed by the Foxes’ decision to chop the adorable and eccentric Ranieri after the fairy tale that was, and few would have had Shakespeare starting his reign with three points against Klopp’s men.

But goals from Jamie Vardy, James Maddison and Harvey Barnes ensured a dream start for the interim Leicester boss with a 3-1 victory, although it was a partnership that wouldn’t go the distance, Leicester instead landed on Claude Puel for 18 months before making a decision for former Reds manager Brendan Rodgers, a man who has once again helped raise the bar in the East Midlands.

But that first-game success has not been repeated by a manager since.

The last time the Reds faced a new manager was against this weekend’s opponents in December 2019, when Nigel Pearson’s first game in charge ended in a 2-0 loss for the Hornets at Anfield. Before that, it was Manuel Pellegrini’s first game at the helm of West Ham United in 2018, a game where the Reds lost 4-0 at Anfield.

In terms of new managers in the Premier League, the Reds have also had a happy hunting ground lately. Daniel Farke’s Norwich City were slashed on opening day in 2019, followed a year later by Marcelo Bielsa’s Leeds United at the start of last season.

This weekend, Klopp’s squad will be looking to make them three real “rebounding new manager” scalps in a row, and the omens are good.