Jurgen Klopp can’t count on ‘big head’ Curtis Jones in Liverpool succession plan

Has Curtis Jones’ ‘big head’ hampered his progress at Liverpool? His career’s gone backwards and he’s forgotten in talks of a midfield succession.

“I had a long talk last week with Curtis, ­because I love the boy and I love the potential he has,” Jurgen Klopp said. “He’s young – very young – but from what I see his ­potential is just incredible. So we have to find a way to show that much more often.”

This was Klopp’s response to a question about Jones’ progress, not now, but over a year ago, at which point there were already concerns that the midfielder hadn’t kicked on as much as the club had hoped. He’s not so “young” anymore, obviously, and very little (possibly none) of the potential Klopp talked about then has been converted into actual impact since. If anything Jones has gone backwards.

Having made his debut nearly four years ago, surely everyone – Jones included – would have expected him to have contributed a hell of a lot more by now.

Jones may well remain at Liverpool beyond the summer, but there is absolutely no chance he’s considered key to Klopp’s midfield succession plan.

He would have been. And this is the big problem for Liverpool – they’ve got a group of formerly brilliant midfielders who are either past it or on the turn, and a group of excellent young midfielders (or at least one in Stefan Bajcetic), but no-one in that middle ground, of Jones’ age and experience.

Ian Wright described him as an “unbelievable find” in March 2021, soon after Klopp claimed Liverpool would have been “lost” without him, Rhys Williams, Neco Williams, Caoimhin Kelleher and Nat Phillips. Liverpool are now lost, and none of those players are doing anything significant to help the team find itself again.

It was sage pundit and soothsayer Graeme Souness who predicted two things would stop Jones becoming a top Premier League player.

“A big head, which I don’t think at Liverpool that will be allowed, or he gets an injury – God forbid.”

Jones has had a couple of minor injuries, but his big-headedness looked set to hamper his progress regardless.

The story goes that Everton turned down six-year-old Jones for being ‘too cocky’ and ‘modelling himself on Cristiano Ronaldo’, which sounds perfectly reasonable because that kid sounds like a right little so-and-so, but also a bit daft in hindsight, given Jones forced himself into the first-team squad of one of the best teams in Europe to star in the Champions League and led us to question whether he had every right to be that arrogant.

But the Evertonians may well now be I-told-you-so-ing, or at least shrugging their shoulders, as they observe the displays of a footballer who’s now not even on a radar that was pinging for an imminent England call-up two seasons or so ago.

Asked whether he had heard which of the Liverpool players may be axed from the squad (because he’s one of the Liverpool players with his head on or near the chopping block, and everyone knows it but him), Jones said he doesn’t expect to be among those leaving the club, and if he does he doesn’t care, because he’s got loads of offers from elsewhere, thank you very much.

“I couldn’t care, no. You know I am a confident lad and I have the backing of the staff. If they turn around and say they think I need to leave or go out on loan then you know there are options there that I already know of anyway.”

He could leave on loan, but given Liverpool will be signing two or three central midfielders this summer, who won’t need to do an awful lot to be a whole lot better than Jones, his temporary exit could very quickly be made permanent.

And that would be fine if Jones wasn’t so absolutely convinced he has a God-given right to be playing at the highest level. A more than decent career at a mid-table Premier League side awaits, but Jones thinks he’s better than that, and given his supposed character, would be far more likely to sulk than thrive having dropped down a level or two.

That’s as big a shame for Klopp and Liverpool as it is for him, with Jones formerly an important part of a succession plan which is now instead focused on Bajcetic and whichever outside hire is now required to step into the void Jones was expected to fill.