Toni Kroos has been one of Real Madrid’s top performers for years. Steven Gerrard was once charged with luring him to Liverpool.
It was the magic pass that put the qualities of Toni Kroos on display. He sent the ball through the air with feeling, the target precisely specified and precisely reached with the precision of a navigation device. Vinicius Junior thanked him and put in a network. The assists of the German national team in the first leg of the Champions League quarter-finals in 2021 between Real Madrid and Liverpool (3: 1) were of course also reflected in the social media, “Querpass-Toni” became a disarming mirror for all Kroos critics .
It was not just that action that also filled the opposing coach with awe of the 31-year-old. “He reminds me of Bernd Schuster,” said Klopp before the second leg against Real, in which the Madrilenians secured a 0-0 advance. The name Schuster is well known in Madrid, after all, he played for two years with the Royal and won the championship twice.
It was definitely noticeable to Klopp how much he would have loved to have a Toni Kroos in his ranks. If it had gone to Liverpool, Kroos would actually have been under contract with the Reds when Klopp took office in October 2015. Liverpool legend Steven Gerrard revealed in his autobiography My storythat he was hired to convince Kroos to move to Anfield in 2014.
“I had an unofficial role at the club in convincing great players to come to Liverpool,” said the current Glasgow Rangers head coach. “It was the same ritual every summer. The club explained to me which player they were targeting and they then asked me to contact him. They thought a request from Liverpool would have more weight if it came from me,” he said Gerrard.
Gerrard: Contacting Kroos, “I was embarrassed”
Kroos was also on the Reds’ wish list in 2014 after it became known that the midfield strategist will not renew his contract with Bayern Munich. So then coach Brendan Rodgers asked his captain to come to Kroos. For Gerrard, it was a hopeless undertaking from the start.
“He just laughed when I told him we were wasting our time. We both admired Kroos very much. I knew that Real Madrid were preparing an offer for FC Bayern, so I was embarrassed when I wrote to Kroos”, Gerrard looks back: “The German was well on the way to winning the world title with his country and Real Madrid was the champion of Europe. But it doesn’t hurt to try, so I gave it a try.”
Kroos won the Champions League four times with Real
The reaction from Kroos to his request stunned Gerrard. “Some of the best footballers in the world can be the most respectful. Kroos didn’t make me feel like a complete idiot,” said Gerrard. But he couldn’t give him any positive news, the move to Real Madrid was more or less through. “We had a nice little exchange and I just said ‘Well done and good luck'”, the 2005 Champions League winner remembers.
The move should more than pay off for Kroos. He has now won the Champions League four times with Real Madrid.
