While supporters scrolled through headlines reading "Klopp's agent seen at Anfield" and pundits dissected every possible implication, Liverpool's players were already on the team bus heading back to Melwood.
The journey took twenty minutes in light traffic, longer when the streets were clogged with fans making their way home. Tonight, it fell somewhere in between. The bus had police escort and drivers who'd made this trip thousands of times, and knew every shortcut and traffic pattern.
Inside the bus, the atmosphere had the comfortable exhaustion of a job well done. Some players had headphones in with music providing a private soundtrack. Others chatted quietly, rehashing moments from the match. A few stared out windows at passing streetlights, lost in whatever private calculations.
Julien sat near the back, watching the familiar streets slide past. He'd made this journey enough times now that he recognized landmarks—that particular pub on the corner with the cracked sign, the Indian restaurant that apparently did brilliant curry according to Gerrard.
Liverpool was starting to feel less like a foreign city and more like somewhere he actually belonged.
When the bus finally pulled through Melwood's gates and into the secure parking area, the players gathered their belongings. Bags were shouldered, conversations continued or abandoned, people went off into the cool October night.
David Dein was waiting for them inside the facility's main entrance.
That alone was unusual enough to make everyone notice. Dein didn't typically greet the team bus after matches, didn't hover around Melwood making his presence felt.
He operated from the background mostly, making phone calls and negotiating contracts and handling the thousand administrative details that kept the club functioning. Seeing him here, at nearly midnight, standing in the corridor with that particular expression, meant something significant was happening.
The players gathered in the corridor, some still in their travel tracksuits, others having changed into casual clothes during the bus ride.
David waited until he had everyone's attention, until the last conversations had trailed off and every face was turned toward him.
"Gentlemen, first things first—your performance at Anfield tonight deserved every bit of applause it received." He made eye contact with several players as he spoke, distributing his attention. "Three-nil against a stubborn opponent, dominant from start to finish, professional in seeing out the result. That's exactly what this club expects and what you should expect from yourselves."
A few players nodded, appreciating the acknowledgment but clearly sensing this wasn't the main purpose of Dein's presence.
"I also want to commend Colin's work as caretaker manager." Dein gestured toward Pascoe, who stood slightly apart from the players, looking like he wasn't quite sure whether he should be part of this gathering or not.
"He stepped into a difficult situation and handled it with professionalism and tactical intelligence. The way he managed tonight's match—the rotations, the substitutions, that was quality coaching."
Colin nodded in acknowledgment but didn't speak, seemed to understand that whatever was coming next, he was more audience than participant.
Dein's expression shifted subtly, became more serious without exactly being grave. When he spoke again, his words carried deliberate weight.
"But right now, I need you to listen carefully." He paused, let that settle. "Put the victory celebrations aside. Put all the outside noise aside—the media speculation, the rumors, the conversations you've been having with each other about what's happening with the club. All of it. Set it down."
Players shifted slightly, exchanging quick glances in awareness that this was the moment they'd been anticipating.
"Here's what I want you to do," Dein continued.
"Go take a proper shower. Get some hot food in you—the kitchen staff have prepared a meal, nothing fancy but proper nutrition to aid recovery.
Then go home and sleep well. Actually sleep, don't stay up scrolling through your phones looking at what people are saying on Twitter. Shake off the fatigue from running for ninety minutes. Let go of all those external speculations rattling around in your heads. Rest up properly, that's the most important thing you can do right now."
He let that instruction hang in the air for a moment, then delivered the key message.
"Tomorrow morning, everyone reports to Melwood at the usual time. Not a minute later. Bring your focus back in. Leave whatever happens outside these walls outside these walls. We need to prepare for Liverpool's new chapter."
The way he said "new chapter" left absolutely no ambiguity about what he meant. This wasn't vague corporate-speak about fresh starts. This was direct communication about fundamental change.
"Don't ask questions you already know the answers to. Don't overthink what's clearly happening. All you need to remember is this: rest well tonight, properly rest, and tomorrow come in with your best form ready. That's how you welcome Liverpool's new era. That's how you show professionalism."
He looked around the corridor, meeting eyes, making sure every single player understood what was being communicated both explicitly and implicitly.
"Got it? Rest tonight. Tomorrow, we start fresh together."
The players exchanged glances, some excited, some apprehensive, some neutral because they'd learned not to show their cards too early when major changes were happening.
Wasn't this a blatant indication that a new manager would be arriving tomorrow?
"Right!" Gerrard spoke first, as captain, as the player who'd been at this club longest and understood both its potential and its capacity for disappointment.
His voice carried clearly down the corridor. "You heard the man. Get cleaned up, get fed, get home, get sleep. Tomorrow, we show whoever walks through that door what Liverpool Football Club is actually capable of when we're not dealing with all this uncertainty."
The squad murmured agreement. Though their individual thoughts varied wildly, the public response was unified.
Dein gave a slight nod of satisfaction and left shortly after, his footsteps echoing down the corridor toward the offices where the actual work of finalizing whatever announcement was coming would be happening into the small hours.
The remaining players stood in relative silence for a moment, processing. Then the groups reformed, conversations were reigniting, this time with the certain knowledge that speculation was over.
Colin Pascoe's emotions were complicated in that moment.
Part of him, the part that loved Liverpool and wanted only success for the club was genuinely pleased. If Klopp was really coming, if all the rumors and hints and Dein's statements were building toward the appointment everyone expected, then Liverpool would be getting one of Europe's most exciting young managers.
Someone who'd proven he could build attacking systems that thrilled fans and terrified opponents. Someone who could potentially restore Liverpool to the elite tier of English football.
But another part of him—the part that had tasted what it felt like to stand in the technical area as the man in charge, to make tactical decisions that directly impacted results, to have his name mentioned in match reports, that part couldn't help but feel a sense of loss.
He'd been interim manager for barely two weeks. Two matches, both won convincingly. He'd made good decisions, managed the squad intelligently, shown tactical awareness that had drawn praise. And now it was ending before he'd really had a chance to prove whether he could do this job long-term.
But that was football. Brutal and unsentimental and always moving forward regardless of individual feelings.
Colin made his farewells to the players with handshakes and brief words of encouragement, maintaining professional composure even as his mind was already turning toward what came next and departed toward his car in the staff parking area.
Behind him, in Melwood's main corridor, the players had broken into lively discussion.
Gerrard, standing with Henderson and Lucas near the corridor's center, spoke as who'd seen multiple managerial changes and understood their implications.
"There've been rumors for days that Dortmund were willing to let Klopp go if the terms were right. Now Dein's basically confirmed everything without saying the words outright, plus the agent being photographed at the match—it's got to be ninety-nine percent certain at this point."
He paused, organizing his thoughts. "If he actually comes, if it really is Klopp walking through that door tomorrow, his system might properly unlock our attack. We've got the personnel for it—pace up front, technical ability in midfield, defenders who can step up and play high. But it'll be intense. His teams don't stop running. We'll need to be ready for that physically and mentally."
Sturridge stood with arms folded across his chest, his voice was carrying cautious optimism mixed with wariness. "But can this actually happen by tomorrow? Won't there be contract negotiations, compensation to Dortmund, all that legal stuff that takes days? And David didn't explicitly say it was Klopp—what if we're getting excited over nothing?"
Gerrard clapped him on the arm with enough force to make him stagger slightly.
"David doesn't make statements like that without reason, mate. If he's telling us to be ready tomorrow, it's because everything significant has already been sorted. The contracts are probably signed, the announcements are probably drafted, they're just waiting for whatever final details need completing before they can make it public.
We can't control what happens with the appointment anyway. What we can control is being sharp in training, showing whoever it is that this squad is ready to work, ready to learn, ready to compete at the highest level. If it really is Klopp, we'll need to be at our absolute best to adapt to his methods quickly.
We've got Arsenal at the weekend—there's no time for a gradual adjustment period."
Henderson nodded in agreement, his expression was serious. "Right. Whoever it is, we've still got to perform on the pitch. Managers can set systems and motivate, but ultimately we're the ones who have to execute."
Around them, other players were having similar conversations at varying volumes.
Suárez and Sturridge were speculating about how Klopp's pressing system might affect their positioning. Some younger players looked nervous, clearly wondering whether a new manager would affect their chances of getting minutes. The established starters seemed more relaxed but still attentive.
Through all of it, Julien remained relatively quiet.
He participated when directly addressed, nodded at appropriate moments, gave brief comments when the conversation turned to him. But mostly he observed, listening to his teammates process news that he'd known for days, watching them arrive at conclusions he'd already reached.
Inside, though, something stirred. Not anxiety exactly, and not quite excitement either. More like anticipation mixed with recognition, the feeling you get when something you've been expecting finally arrives and proves to be exactly what you anticipated.
Liverpool's new era genuinely seemed to be starting tomorrow.
Not metaphorically, not in some vague future-tense sense, but literally tomorrow morning when players reported for training and found a German manager with a distinctive personality and tactical philosophy standing there ready to transform everything about how they approached football.
And Julien knew something none of the others: this managerial change would mean more for Liverpool than anyone else yet understood.
This was the moment everything changed.
The thought settled over him with the weight of inevitability, and he found himself moving toward the corridor's windows, away from the clustered conversations, seeking a moment of solitude to process what was coming.
The other players were too absorbed in their own discussions to notice him slip away. He stood at the window, hands in his pockets, and looked out at the Melwood grounds beyond.
For once, after weeks of Liverpool's typical grey overcast that made every day feel continuously on the verge of rain, it was actually clear.
The sky at the horizon was painted in warm tones. A gentle, glowing red that seemed to radiate warmth despite the chill seeping through the window glass.
It looked exactly like the scarves that transformed Anfield's stands into a sea of color during "You'll Never Walk Alone," thousands of them raised in synchronization, creating that visual moment that visitors to the ground always remembered.
Like the crest embroidered on his Liverpool shirt, that liver bird in profile surrounded by flames of eternal hope. Like the burning heart that young fan had drawn on that piece of cardboard tonight, pressing the marker so hard into the surface that the passion was visible in every line.
Red.
Liverpool red.
The color of history and expectation and everything this club aspired to become again.
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