The secret to replacing Jurgen Klopp? It’s all about the analytics...

How do you fill the boots of a footballing genius? For Liverpool’s owners and original Moneyballers, Fenway Sports Group, the answer lies in a forensic data-driven approach, which they’ve been finessing for 20 years, explains Richard Jolly

CEO Billy Hogan will lead the search to replace Jurgen Klopp as Liverpool coach (PA)

There was a moment when Billy Hogan contemplated the impossible task of replacing the man sat to his right and offered a reminder that Liverpool’s owners, Fenway Sports Group, were football’s original Moneyballers. They were so fixed on the idea that John W Henry had tried to hire Billy Beane, the poster boy for baseball’s statistical approach to recruitment, to take charge of the Boston Red Sox. Some two decades later and on the other side of the Atlantic, Hogan reflected on the search for Jurgen Klopp’s successor.

“The way we operate as a football club is to make sure we look at all the information and all the data, we’ve done our proper due diligence, and then make a decision,” said Liverpool’s CEO. The charisma Hogan referenced can feel like Klopp’s most obvious quality now: the outgoing manager is very much a people person. Yet he is also a data darling: he famously steered Borussia Dortmund to the 2013 Champions League final on a wage bill less than that of Queens Park Rangers, who were relegated from the Premier League that season.

Liverpool have prospered at the numbers game under Klopp, perhaps winning less than they might have but punching above their financial weight. Following the numbers now could take them back to Germany: the most obvious candidate to take over, Xabi Alonso, could become the first manager since Klopp to win the Bundesliga with any club other than Bayern Munich and is found at Leverkusen, a mere 40 miles from Dortmund.