Klopp returns to management with Germany — released from Red Bull in an unusual deal, first match Sept 24

Germany paid to get him out of Red Bull

Klopp has not coached a team since he left Liverpool in the summer of 2024. For the past year he had been Red Bull's Head of Global Soccer, an office role overseeing the drinks company's clubs. Prising him out of that job was not simple. According to the terms reported around the announcement, the DFB agreed to donate €1 million to Red Bull's Wings for Life spinal-research foundation and committed to playing three Germany home internationals in Leipzig — a Red Bull city — by 2030. In other words, Germany did not sign a free agent; they negotiated a release, and paid for it in money and fixtures.

The contract runs to the 2030 World Cup, four years away. That length is the point: this is a rebuild appointment, not a caretaker one.

What he inherits

Klopp replaces Julian Nagelsmann, who stepped down after Germany went out of this World Cup in the round of 32, beaten on penalties by Paraguay. For a four-time world champion that was an early, sore exit, and it triggered the vacancy. Klopp's first match in charge is a friendly against the Netherlands on September 24 — itself a meeting of two sides that both fell in the last 32.

France names its coach on July 28

Germany's hire is not happening in isolation. On Tuesday, July 28, at 11:00 CET, the French Football Federation and its president Philippe Diallo will present the successor to Didier Deschamps, who stepped away after France finished fourth — beaten by Spain in the semi-final and by England in the third-place match. French and international media have for weeks treated Zinedine Zidane, out of a job since he left Real Madrid in 2021, as the near-certain choice. Until the federation speaks on the 28th it is not official, and that distinction matters: as of today the France job is a reported appointment, the Germany job is a signed one.

The read for 2030

Strip away the star names and the pattern is simple. A losing World Cup emptied several benches — Nagelsmann and Deschamps left on their own terms, others were pushed — and the seats are now being filled by some of the biggest figures in the game as the next four-year cycle opens. That cycle is the same one Japan has just entered under Hajime Moriyasu's renewed tenure. For a Japanese reader, the useful takeaway is not the celebrity of it but the calendar: two traditional powers have handed their 2030 projects to Klopp and, almost certainly, Zidane, and both will be on the touchline as early as late September. The rebuilds start now, not in 2029.