Liverpool news: 'You would not believe it' — Milner reveals how Klopp pushed Liverpool players to the limit

James Milner had a front-row seat for one of the most successful eras in Liverpool's recent history. Signed by the club in 2015, the same summer Jurgen Klopp took charge at Anfield, the midfielder was there for the full transformation of the Reds into serial winners.

Over eight seasons, Milner was part of a squad that won the Champions League, the Premier League, the FA Cup, the League Cup, the FIFA Club World Cup and the UEFA Super Cup. He left Anfield in 2023, a year before Klopp's own departure, and had a final season at Brighton and Hove Albion before retiring at the end of the 2025-26 campaign at the age of 40.

Klopp, meanwhile, served as Red Bull's Global Head of Football after leaving Liverpool before resigning from that role in July this year to take charge of the Germany national team.

Speaking on The Good, The Bad & The Football podcast alongside Manchester United legends Paul Scholes and Nicky Butt, Milner offered a rare behind-the-scenes account of Klopp's approach during pre-season tours in Asia.

The Klopp method during those trips involved a carefully managed middle ground between the time zone of the host country and British time, designed to minimise the effects of jet lag on the squad's return. In practice, that arrangement produced some punishing early mornings.

'We would not be on their time zone, we would not be on English time, we would be somewhere in the middle so the jet lag would not be as bad,' Milner explained. 'So the tour schedule ended up being: we would wake up and go straight into a running session before breakfast.'

The discomfort did not end there. After completing those sessions, the players boarded the team bus, only for Klopp to refuse to allow the air conditioning to be switched on.

'On tour time it was half twelve, one o'clock, the hottest part of the day. So we're doing laps on the track. The hottest part of the day. It was absolutely boiling. We got on the bus and he would not let us put the air con on,' Milner said.

'We had to sit there for about half an hour stuck in traffic, everyone absolutely melting with no air conditioning. I do not know if it was because he thought we would get cold or for some other reason.'

What those anecdotes illustrate is the central role that physical preparation played in Klopp's methodology from the very first day. Pre-season tours that might elsewhere be associated with commercial obligations and a gradual build-up were, under the German manager, used as an immediate statement of intent.

For a seasoned professional like Milner, who had worked under a succession of managers with different approaches throughout his career, the harshness of Klopp's sessions was not a temporary feature of early pre-season. It was the standard, and it remained so.

On The Good, The Bad & The Football, Milner was clear that the Klopp the public saw was exactly the same man the players encountered every morning at the training ground.

'Yeah, I think the great thing about Jurgen was probably that what you see is what you get,' he said. 'Some people are very different in front of the camera and behind the camera. He was exactly what you see: loads of energy, demanded high standards in everything he did.'

Those standards were felt immediately by anyone new to the environment. Milner's account of Klopp's first sessions at Liverpool has become the stuff of Anfield legend.

'His standards are great, infectious, obviously, and sessions were really tough when you first came in,' he said. 'Like, you would not believe people throwing up at the side of the pitch, and yeah, it was ruthless.'

It is a recollection that carries particular weight coming from a player like Milner, whose career was defined by longevity, versatility and an ability to adapt to whatever was asked of him. Throughout virtually the entire Klopp era at Liverpool, those qualities made him one of the manager's most trusted squad members, even as the demands never let up.

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