Jurgen Klopp ‘bombshell’ revealed as Man United plot unlikely Liverpool raid | OneFootball

The most predictable story of the year gets the ‘bombshell’ treatment while The Sun have their FA Cup draw conspiracy theories and eat them, and the Daily Express immediately lose all confidence in an idea that exists only in their heads.

It’s just another standard day in Mediawatch Land, basically.

Enjoy.

Shell company

Mediawatch frequently comes across stories that contain absolutely no viable content whatsoever. Mediawatch frequently comes across stories that promise a ‘bombshell’.

But even now, in the journalistic wasteland that is the year of someone’s lord 2026, it’s still pretty rare to come across one that combines both.

Even an underwhelming, oversold ‘bombshell’ usually has some trace, homeopathic levels of explosive power.

Not this effort from the Mirror, though.

If your first thought is that you reckon you could have a pretty good guess at what might be the response to such approaches of a man whose oft-stated position on ever being a manager again is ‘probably not, and definitely not anyone other than Liverpool in England’ then congratulations, you are correct.

He turned them down. Obviously. But the other important thing here is what form these ‘approaches’ took.

Because Klopp’s agent, Marc Kosicke is very throwaway in his summary of these things. There is no suggestion of serious talks or even particularly a serious enquiry.

The implication here is pretty clear. What’s happened is that Manchester United and Chelsea, when in need of new managers, checked in with the agent of an excellent former Premier League manager just to double-check his views hadn’t changed. That’s it. You’re talking one phone call here.

Now we can all enjoy the thought of Jason Wilcox getting pied off very quickly in that phone call, but that’s all it is. It’s not like Chelsea or United or anyone else had drawn up contracts and were fully expecting him to sign on the dotted line.

They made cursory enquiries that it would, frankly, have been negligent not to make despite knowing the overwhelmingly likely outcome of those approaches. That overwhelmingly likely outcome being two-fold: Klopp saying no; and the Daily Mirror later pretending that any of what just happened there constitutes a bombshell.

Three is a magic number

Credit where it’s due to the Daily Express for piquing our interest with this headline.

Can they now? Fascinating.

We’re as unconvinced as anyone by reports of Alexis Mac Allister emerging as a ‘shock target’ for Man United, but it’s not impossible for it to happen. Yet for many reasons it’s very complicated, extremely difficult and wildly unlikely.

The Express have found a path through the weeds, though.

Alrighty then, let’s hear them out. Which players could they send?

Option one, and we’re not off to a strong start here, is Kobbie Mainoo. The Express lose confidence in themselves almost straight away here.

Alas, yes. But don’t worry, everyone. Still two options to go, and we’re sure one of these will be a goer. Who’s next? It’s only bloomin’ Manuel Ugarte.

Ah, yeah, that does seem a bit of a problem. Third time’s the charm, though, yeah? Who else is there?

Hmm. Starting to think maybe Man United can’t send three players to Liverpool to seal Alexis Mac Allister swap deal after all.

Sometimes it really is okay to admit an idea hasn’t quite come off and just spike it.

Man, the rigging

Mediawatch accepts that a certain amount of cake-and-eat-it mischief is pretty much unavoidable in today’s media climate. We indulge in a bit of it ourselves while unconvincingly trying to tell ourselves that it’s okay for our headlines to be a bit naughty because it’s done with a wink and a nod and thank you for the clicks, much obliged.

But we remain entirely uncomfortable with the way massive media outlets launder clicky yet obviously unprintably bullsh*t claims through the medium of no-mark social-media posts.

We’ve not explained that particularly well, but luckily The Sun have a textbook example today. Always better to show than tell.

This is an absolute gimme, as long as you have no scruples. The nature of an open draw such as the FA Cup’s is that some teams will get easier draws and others will get tougher ones, and that fans of those who feel hard done by will inevitably Take To Social Media to complain about it being rigged.

But that’s all it is. Empty, pointless and above all baseless frustration. It’s not a news story. Or at least it shouldn’t be.

Especially when you try to wriggle out of it with not so much a caveat as a one-word demolition of the entire conceit buried deep, deep down below the bluster and fume.

The fact it’s incorrect is why you didn’t need to write the previous 400 words, lads. Or then directly after that sentence insert a poll asking ‘Was the draw rigged?’ with the options ‘100% yes – it’s obvious’, ‘Nah they just got lucky’ and – Mediawatch’s personal favourite – ‘I can’t decide’.

Actively clicking on a poll to say you can’t decide between two other answers, one of which is definitely wrong and one of which is definitely right, is simply fascinating behaviour.

Missing words round

Another quick instalment of a current Mediawatch favourite, courtesy of the Mirror.