Klopp Receives £45.000 Fine Following West Ham Comments

The FA have handed down their sentence following Jürgen Klopp’s post-match comments after the 1-1- draw with West Ham back in January, and it’s a doozy, relieving the German of 45.000 of his hard-earned pounds sterling.

“Jürgen Klopp has been fined £45,000 after accepting an FA charge for comments made following Liverpool’s league game against West Ham United on 4 February 2019,” read the Football Association’s official statement. “His comments made during a post-match interview breached FA Rule E3(1), as they questioned the integrity of the match referee and/or implied bias.”

The fine represents an exponential increase since the last time the manager was found in breach of the rules, when he was fined £8.000 for his celebration of Divock Origi’s game winner in the Merseyside derby back in December. It makes sense that the FA would take perceived attacks on their referees more seriously than a manager running onto the pitch.

In the end, Klopp can have few complaints about the punishment, as questioning a referee’s integrity — no matter how provably incompetent the match official in question — is a clear breach of protocol, and if his comments following his previous sanctioning is anything to go by, Klopp will have no problem accepting the FA’s decision.

“If you break the rules you have to be fined for it,” the former Dortmund man stated after the Everton incident.

Now, if the FA were to implement some sort of system that demoted referees more readily based on their terrible performances, these sorts of situations would probably occur less often. Don’t hold your breath, though.