As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to affect the Premier League, Jurgen Klopp has stated that Liverpool will be careful of recruiting unvaccinated players in the future.
After Aston Villa’s match against Burnley was called off on Saturday, there has been an increase in positive cases among Premier League clubs spurred by the Omicron variant in the United Kingdom, with six games postponed this weekend.
The English Football League (EFL) recently declared that 25% of its 72 clubs’ players will refuse to be vaccinated against COVID-19.
When asked at a news conference if a player’s vaccination status would influence the club’s decision to sign him, Klopp replied: “Yes, it will be influential.
“Let’s take our situation, if a player is not vaccinated at all, he’s a constant threat for all of us. Of course, he doesn’t want to be a threat and it’s not like he thinks: ‘I don’t care about the others,’ but he is.
“So, we have to find different scenarios. He’ll have to change in a different dressing room, eat in a different dining room, sit in a different bus or a different car. From an organization’s point of view, it’s a real mess.
“If you really want to follow the protocols, it’s incredibly difficult to do. If one gets COVID and he was around him in the last four days, he will be in isolation. If we have to travel to a country where we play international football and we come back, he has to self-isolate so of course, it will be influential.
“So, we’ll have to do extra building for unvaccinated players and it will not happen, hopefully not. Hopefully, that won’t be necessary in the future.”
In mid-October, the Premier League’s most recent data on player vaccination levels revealed that 81 percent of players had gotten at least one vaccination shot, with 68 percent having been twice vaccinated.
In contrast, Serie A in Italy claimed that 98 percent of its players had gotten two vaccinations, but that the league had no information on the number of players who had taken the third dose.
When asked if immunizations should be mandatory, Klopp responded, “I don’t think so.” “It’s a matter of persuasion. I believe it should be mandatory from a moral standpoint for each individual, but not from a legal standpoint.
“I don’t see that but from a moral point of view because if I can do something that helps the people around me, that’s for me mandatory. Obviously, people see that differently.
“I am 54 years old and I really am a big believer in that you can convince people about the right things to do, but I’m not sure in this specific case.
“England is in a much better place vaccination rate-wise than Germany is for example. It’s unbelievable how aggressive the anti-vaxxer scene is and how clear they are in that they obviously know better than the rest of us.
“It’s really tricky, really tricky. But no, I don’t think it should be mandatory legally, but morally, yes.”
On Sunday, Liverpool travel to Tottenham Hotspur to face a team that hasn’t played since December 5 because to a COVID-19 outbreak among the playing and coaching staff.
After a 3-1 win over Newcastle United in midweek, Liverpool are in second place, one point behind league leaders Manchester City.
