When Liverpool substitute Daniel Sturridge was handed a note by his boss Jurgen Klopp just before he entered the field of play in his side’s EFL Cup semi-final 1st leg defeat at Southampton, rather than memorise his manager’s tactics he chose to take the note with him onto the pitch. Looking down at his notes with utter confusion as he ran, he then screwed it up and lobbed it. And not even at James Milner. Missed a trick there.
So what was it that Sturridge had such difficulty understanding? German? Algebra? A picture of a ball and a goal with an arrow in-between? A graphic drawing of a ladies’ part? No. It turned out to be simply “3-5-2”, the system Klopp wanted to adopt.
Maybe he thought it was a mathematical teaser and having failed to solve the sum, tossed it aside. The numbers he will remember, though, are 1 and zero, the numbers on the scoreboard, in that order.

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