GABBY AGBONLAHOR has continued his war of words with Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp, claiming the German is JEALOUS that Manchester City signed Erling Haaland.
Klopp claimed no one can compete financially with Gulf-state owned City, Paris Saint-Germain and Newcastle.
However, Klopp’s comments upset City, who felt his comments were “borderline xenophobic”.
The Liverpool boss strongly pushed back on those suggestions and a legal complaint has been made.
And former Aston Villa striker Agbonlahor believes Klopp’s comments were more out of frustration with how good Haaland has been since his £51million summer transfer.
The Norway star, 22, has already scored 20 goals across all competitions this season.
Agbonlahor told talkSPORT Breakfast: “When you look at him, maybe he’s frustration at how good Haaland has done.
“If you look at both squads, Liverpool have been going toe-to-toe with Man City in the last three or four seasons and in the summer Haaland has come to City, Nunez has gone to Liverpool, yes they’ve signed Kalvin Phillips as well, but it’s not as if they’ve bought five or six more players.
“He’s just a bit frustrated with how his team have underperformed.
“Is it more frustration from Klopp at how good Haaland has done and Nunez hasn’t so far done as well.
“I don’t think he was trying to stoke the fire, it’s just a bit of frustration that in future transfer windows he knows he’s not got the money to go and buy Bellingham for £120million.
“Manchester City, if I was them, I probably would go and buy Bellingham.
“Ilkay Gundogan is in his 30s and they might say ‘yeah, we have got the power to go and buy Bellingham instead of Liverpool because we want him at our club and not yours’.”
Agbonlahor did, however, agree with Klopp’s comments on the spending power of Gulf-State clubs.
He continued: “I think he’s got a point. You see Newcastle, Paris Saint-Germain, Man City, the amount of money they’ve got and the amount they can pay their players, the amount they spent on transfers.
“You can see where it’s coming from, but it’s just strange to hear it when he’s been going toe-to-toe with Manchester City.
“They beat Man City, I thought they were the better team. They were strange comments when you aren’t far behind them in the quality of the team.”
Agbonlahor’s latest swipe is one of many he has taken at Klopp in recent months.
Just last week, Klopp was branded a “petulant child” by Agbonlahor.
While some of Agbonlahor’s comments from August even got a reaction out of Klopp as the German recalled a thrashing of the former striker’s Villa.
