Андони Ираола Ливерпүүлийн бэлтгэлийн арга барил болон удирдлагын хэв маягийг өөрчилж байна

When staff go looking for Andoni Iraola, they frequently discover that his plush office at Liverpool’s Kirkby training complex is empty.

The Basque coach isn’t one for shutting himself away when there’s work to be done in terms of planning and analysing.

If you want to find Iraola in the building, you’re best heading next door to the coaches’ office, where he spends a lot more time and feels much more at home alongside his trusted lieutenants.

According to sources, who, like all of those spoken to for this article, unless otherwise noted, asked to be kept anonymous to protect relationships, that’s the base for first-team coaches Tommy Elphick and Shaun Cooper, and assistant coach Pablo de la Torre, who all followed Iraola to Merseyside from Bournemouth this summer. Goalkeeping coaches Colin Stewart and Alejandro Rosalen, and individual development lead coach Luiz Fernando Iubel can also be found there.

There’s no doubting who is the boss on the training pitch as Iraola leads sessions and cuts an animated figure as he bellows instructions and tries to get his ideas across.

However, off the field, the leadership style of the man tasked with masterminding a new era at Anfield is understated. There’s no ego, and he prefers to keep a low profile around the place.

Over the course of a six-week pre-season, sources say players have been struck by how few meetings they have been called into compared to Arne Slot’s reign. The meetings they have tend to be more concise than during the previous two years under the Dutchman.

Most of what Iraola has to say is relayed to them on the grass. Away from the training pitch, it’s rare to see him deep in conversation with any members of his squad. He prefers to maintain some distance.

It was something left-back Milos Kerkez, who worked under him at Bournemouth, touched on when he spoke to reporters last month during the pre-season tour of America.

“He likes to talk sometimes but not a lot,” the Hungary international said. “I think maybe he wants to show that everyone is the same in the team, so he doesn’t want to get too close to anyone in particular. He keeps it professional with a lot of hard work. He shows a lot of emotions on the sidelines, but in the locker room and in training he’s pretty calm.”

As Slot’s reign unravelled, the fact he lived in Greater Manchester was used as a stick to beat him with. The former Feyenoord boss stood accused of being too detached from the local fanbase.

Sources say Iraola and his family have moved into a house in Formby, the same town 13 miles north of Liverpool city centre where predecessors Jurgen Klopp and Brendan Rodgers both lived. Indeed, all of the current coaching staff are now resident in Merseyside, which represents a significant change.

Most days players report to Kirkby at the slightly earlier time of around 9.30am, with training starting around noon. Pre-season has been gruelling, but the feedback on the sessions has been positive.

“The intensity what we need, it’s here now,” midfielder Dominik Szoboszlai told reporters in Chicago before the friendly against Leeds United. “What we have been missing, it’s back from the coach’s side, and from the players’ side as well.”

There’s been a big emphasis on pressing as a unit and moving the ball quickly as Iraola tries to install the kind of bold, attacking football which put him at the front of the queue when Liverpool looked for Slot’s successor.

Dividing his squad into three or four teams, he likes a competitive edge in the drills, with “consequences” for the losers, which means extra running.

“He’s not scared to play one-on-one all over the pitch, to press high and to be on the front foot always,” added Kerkez. “If you see footage of how we all are after training, all lying down, then you can see what he is preparing us for. I think he’s going to suit this team perfectly.”

It hasn’t all been plain sailing for Iraola during pre-season.

The staggered return of star names after the World Cup meant that captain Virgil van Dijk, Cody Gakpo, Alisson, Victor Munoz and Alexis Mac Allister weren’t involved in the tour of America.

Jeremy Jacquet, Hugo Ekitike, Conor Bradley, Giovanni Leoni, Wataru Endo and Stefan Bajcetic travelled but played no part due to injury. Joe Gomez joined that list of absentees within eight minutes of the opening friendly against Sunderland in Nashville.

Being so depleted defensively led Liverpool to sign Uruguay international Ronald Araujo on a season-long loan from Barcelona earlier this month. His experience and ability to operate at both centre-back and right-back were deemed invaluable. It’s far from ideal going into the Premier League opener at Newcastle United that Jacquet and Araujo have each had just 45 minutes of action in preparation. One of them will need to partner Van Dijk at St James’ Park.

Liverpool’s recruitment drive this summer hasn’t been straightforward. On July 21, Iraola told reporters in Chicago, “We definitely need to sign a winger.” Over a month later, it still hasn’t happened. Mohamed Salah hasn’t been replaced.

After the doomed pursuit of Yan Diomande, who left RB Leipzig for Real Madrid, they turned their attention to Paris Saint-Germain’s Bradley Barcola, but their attempts to agree a fee for the France international remain ongoing.

Mohamed Salah, who has joined Trabzonspor, has not been replaced (Ahmad Mora/Getty Images)

Liverpool have also had an improved bid of £60million rejected by Brighton & Hove Albion for Yankuba Minteh, with Iraola hoping that they can add two wide attackers to the squad before the deadline on September 1.

“We don’t have enough players specifically to play in those positions,” the head coach told reporters at his press conference on Friday. In other words, he doesn’t currently have all the tools required to do the job to the best of his ability.

There are understandable concerns over the drain of leadership and experience following the exits of Salah, Andy Robertson, Ibrahima Konate and Curtis Jones.

But there’s also excitement over the growing signs of a connection between Alexander Isak and Florian Wirtz. A key element of Iraola’s plan to help ensure that £241million double act belatedly fulfil their potential at Anfield is to get them operating closer together on the field.

Wirtz was shunted around under Slot, but Iraola sees him as a No 10 who can unlock defences. Isak has benefited from having a proper pre-season and looks ready to start living up to expectations as the most expensive signing in Premier League history.

Iraola described getting Szoboszlai tied down to a new five-year contract as the “greatest news since I arrived” and you can understand the sentiment given his growing influence on the side. The Hungary international has been handed vice-captain status along with Alisson and Gomez.

There’s been an attacking fluency and tempo to Liverpool’s build-up in the friendlies which was missing for so much of last season. However, they have faded in matches and weaknesses remain — they still look vulnerable out of possession and too easy to play through, while defending set-pieces is still a worry.

With Fenway Sports Group CEO of football Michael Edwards leaving last month and sporting director Richard Hughes expected to follow after this summer’s window, there’s no shortage of uncertainty and instability above Iraola.

There are also doubts over how long owners FSG will stay at the helm, having recently agreed to sell around a 38 per cent stake in Liverpool to 1892 Holdings, a consortium led by Amit Bhatia and including U.S. billionaire Jeff Bezos.

Iraola has enough on his plate proving that he can handle the step up to a club the size of Liverpool after three productive years at Bournemouth. He’s about to manage in the Champions League for the first time and will need to adjust his training regime to suit those added demands.

He’s already had a taste of the extra scrutiny that will accompany his every word, having been surprised by how his comments were interpreted after the 3-2 friendly defeat by Monaco when Liverpool surrendered a 2-0 lead.

“We played a good first half, especially a good 30 minutes,” he said. “Right now, we probably don’t have much more, in terms of the levels required to play like this.” Headlines followed about how Iraola felt his players weren’t fit enough torun for more than half an hour.