Liverpool cult hero made surprise Eurovision cameo after butting heads with Jurgen Klopp

A former Liverpool cult hero who was publicly shot down by Jurgen Klopp once delighted fans with a surprise appearance at Eurovision. Ragnar Klavan, who played for the Reds between 2016 and 2018, was loved by supporters during his spell on Merseyside.

The tough-tackling defender quickly endeared himself to the Anfield faithful after joining Liverpool from Augsburg in 2016. It saw him become the most expensive Estonian footballer ever, with the Reds paying around £4.2million for his signature.

Klavan was as surprised as anybody that Liverpool came calling for him, later admitting that he initially thought Everton were the interested party.

Recalling his Anfield spell, he told the club website: “My agent said: ‘The Liverpool team is interested’. I asked: ‘Everton?’. He said: ‘No, no, the red ones’. I wasn’t some kind of superstar in Germany.

“I was just a hard-working player, so to get this kind of news shocked my world. A few months later, I fulfilled my dream by completing the transfer to Liverpool and my world pretty much changed overnight.”

A memorable injury-time winner at Burnley and the ‘Klavan Turn’ saw him achieve cult hero status at Liverpool before he joined Cagliari in 2018. Despite being adored by fans, he butted heads with Klopp when a story he gave to the media turned out to be a misunderstanding.

Klavan raised eyebrows in 2021 when he claimed that James Milner nearly got into a physical fight with Klopp in the dressing room. He said the Liverpool boss was under pressure at the time and ‘would have gone all the way just to prove his point’.

It prompted Klopp to issue a firm rebuttal of Klavan’s version of events as he lifted the lid on what really happened.

“I don’t know exactly what Ragnar’s level is but we were not close [to fighting],” he explained. “I know which situation he means, but I didn’t step in his direction.

“Everybody knows how I look when I speak or shout. It looks quite aggressive without being aggressive and maybe Ragnar was not used to that yet.”

Five years after leaving Liverpool, Klavan returned to Merseyside for a brief cameo appearance at Eurovision when it was held in the city. He appeared on screen to read out the scores from Estonia, leaving Reds supporters delighted and bewildered in equal measure.

Announcing the winner of maximum points, he said: “Hello, amazing city of Liverpool calling. Wow, what a show, what a boss night and all the Estonians are certainly putting it straight to the people of Ukraine that You’ll Never Walk Alone.”