Sevilla’s Spanish head coach Unai Emery (R) shakes hands with Liverpool’s German head coach Jurgen Klopp after Sevilla won the UEFA Europa League final football match between Liverpool FC and Sevilla FC at the St Jakob-Park stadium in Basel, on May 18, 2016. AFP
Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp collected his fifth successive losers medal after the Reds’ 3-1 defeat to Sevilla in the Europa League final on Wednesday.
Liverpool had been hoping to end their 15-year wait for Europa League glory having last won the competition, as the UEFA Cup, in a nine-goal thriller against Deportivo Alaves in 2001.
But a second-half fightback on Wednesday saw Spanish midfielder Coke hit a brace in the space of six minutes to help Sevilla to their third consecutive and fifth trophy overall from Europe’s second-tier competition.
It means five-time European champions Liverpool have not won a European trophy since their stunning comeback victory over AC Milan in the final of the Champions League in 2005.
Klopp, meanwhile, now has a fifth successive losers medal from his past five finals, the last of which came in February when Liverpool lost the League Cup final on penalties to Manchester City.
In Klopp’s last match as manager of Borussia Dortmund, the Bundesliga side suffered a 3-1 defeat to Wolfsburg in the German Cup final—the second successive setback in the competition after an extra-time defeat to Bayern Munich in the 2014 final.
But the defeat that arguably hurt the Liverpool manager most came against Bayern in the all-German final of the Champions League in 2013 when Arjen Robben hit a late winner for the Bavarian giants.
“I promise everybody we will use it (Wednesday’s loss) and come back stronger. It was 50-60% of our usual quality and we have to accept that. We will come back,” said Klopp after the game.