Robert Huth's Bold Take on Jurgen Klopp's Germany

Robert Huth has never been one to dress things up. Asked what Jurgen Klopp has to deliver with Germany for his new contract terms to be honoured, the former international cut straight through the politeness.

“Be less sh*t!” he told GOAL, speaking via SportsbookReview.com. “The bar isn't very high, I think, at the moment.”

Crude. Honest. And, in the context of Germany’s last decade, hard to argue with.

Klopp effect before a ball is kicked

Klopp has not yet taken charge of a single Germany game, with Euro 2028 looming further down the line, but Huth insists the mood has already changed in the country.

“What that appointment has done already in Germany, without Germany having played a game yet, is kind of brought that togetherness straight away,” he said. “Which kind of happened on the day he was appointed. Everyone was going, ‘yes, yes, now we've got that guy who we wanted 10 years ago’.”

Germany, in Huth’s eyes, finally has the figurehead it has craved since the glory of 2014 faded into a long, grey hangover. The man who electrified Dortmund, then turned Liverpool into a relentless winning machine, is now being asked to do something even harder: reconnect a nation with its team.

“Obviously, he was with Liverpool and Dortmund prior to that,” Huth added. “But he's got that personality, the mindset, the knowledge of what it takes to get a nation back together.”

A press conference that made an ex-pro reach for his boots

Huth admits he was swept up by Klopp’s first press conference as Germany boss. Not by clever lines or grand promises, but by the blunt clarity of the message.

“I don't know if you saw his first press conference,” Huth said. “I was like, ‘oh, where are my boots, I want to put my boots back on and start playing again!’ Not that I would be selected, but do you know what I mean? Like, I was watching the press conference again.”

He loved the absence of spin.

“I can only imagine being an active player and listening to a press conference because there was no BS. There were no clever words. It was like, ‘listen, if you want to play for Germany, you're going to have to run a bit harder, you're going to have to fight harder, this is going to mean a bit more when you put the badge on’.”

Klopp, crucially, did not waste time pointing fingers at those who came before him.

“It could have been very easy to throw the previous managers under the bus, ‘that was rubbish’, which I don't think he did,” Huth noted. “He just went, ‘well, we need that bit more when comparing Germany to other nations that got further in the Euros and in the World Cup’.”

Heavy words, heavier demands

So far, Klopp’s work has been largely off the pitch: meetings, visits, visibility. But the early reviews from inside German football are glowing.

“So, so far, he talks a good game,” Huth said. “The feedback's been good from the Bundesliga clubs. He's gone to plenty of games in pre-season and in the club games. So it looks great on paper.”

On paper is one thing. Tournament football is another. Huth expects a very different Germany when the next major competitions roll around.

“I fully imagine Germany is going to be a lot better in the upcoming tournaments than they have been in the past,” he said. “Not to say that they're going to win it. I think even themselves said, ‘listen, we're going to try and win it, of course, that's the aim, but there's France, there's England, there's Brazil, there's Argentina, there's some proper other football nations out there, but we're going to get out there and certainly leave everything on a pitch’.”

That last part is the real accusation. For Huth, Germany have not been leaving everything on the pitch for years.

“That hasn’t been the case in Germany’s situation over the last few years,” he said. “So I'm excited. Come on, Germany!”

From world champions to also-rans

The contrast with 2014 still stings. A decade on from lifting the World Cup in Brazil, Huth does not sugarcoat the decline.

“We've been sh*t since 2014 so a semi-final would be all right,” he admitted.

That is the level of expectation now: not automatic talk of finals, not an assumption of dominance, but a realistic target of simply going deep into a tournament again. Yet Huth believes Klopp’s trademark style can drag Germany back into that conversation.

“If Germany can replicate any kind of Liverpool's and Dortmund's intensity, pace, energy, spirit, I'm getting excited!” he said. “I know it's difficult to replicate it in the national team, but if they can do it, if you can do it, that would be heavy metal football!”

Intensity. Pace. Energy. Spirit. Heavy metal football in a Germany shirt.

If Klopp really manages to turn that idea into reality, “be less sh*t” might start to sound like the understatement of a new era.