Former Chelsea, Real Madrid and Cameroon player Geremi has hit out at Jurgen Klopp over a comment he made about the Africa Cup of Nations in November.
The Liverpool manager was discussing the lack of international breaks for his players from then until March, but reminded journalists there was a ‘little tournament in Africa’ coming up.
Klopp said: ‘No international break until March, I’ve heard that so often, but in January there’s a little tournament in Africa, I just want to say.’
He was questioned about his comment at the time and said that he didn’t mean it in a disrespectful way, saying: ‘It’s all good, I didn’t mean it like that. I don’t know why you understand it like that to be honest.
‘I didn’t mean it like that, come on… so I was not even close to it being the idea in my mind that I want to talk about the AFCON as a ‘little tournament’ or about the continent of Africa as a “little continent”, not at all.’
However, the words stuck with Geremi, and the twice winner of the competition has explained just how important AFCON is to him.
‘When Jurgen Klopp described the Africa Cup of Nations as a “little tournament” I was far from impressed,’ Geremi wrote for the Daily Mail.
‘A lot of fans from outside of Africa may not know but in my view, AFCON is the third most important football tournament on the planet and it means so much to anyone competing on this stage.
‘I am unhappy about Klopp’s remarks, to say the least, and think it’s a big shame that the Liverpool manager has not respected the competition.’
Klopp, who has lost Mohamed Salah, Sadio Mane and Keita to AFCON this year, continued the defence of his comment, adding: ‘What I meant was, if you watch the whole press conference then you might have understood it the right way if you wanted to, because I said there are no international breaks until March now.
‘I said “oh there’s a little tournament in January” and I didn’t mean a little tournament, I was just saying it’s still a tournament, it’s ironic. It’s still a tournament, a big one. We lose our best players to that tournament…’
