Klopp cuddles way to top

Ahead of tonight’s show of Bundespower, the sporting week recalled one standout image; displaced maestro Shinji Kagawa and distraught mentor Jurgen Klopp cradling one another tenderly as they were rent apart by the gaudy attractions of Manchester United.

“We cried for 20 minutes, in each other’s arms, when he left.”

We must be careful, of course, since it was Klopp — in a marvellous interview with the Guardian — who provided us with that image. If it is a faithful account, it may explain Shinji’s early struggles at Old Trafford. A man incapable of extricating himself after, at most, a minute or two, and mumbling, ‘boss, this is getting weird’, was not quite ready to face Fergie.