Salzburg’s victory in the Champions League is the 1st in eight games for the Red Bull teams that Jürgen Klopp brings

ROTTERDAM, Netherlands (AP) — The soon-to-be Red Bull family of soccer clubs overseen by Jürgen Klopp finally got a first win in the Champions League on Wednesday.

Before Salzburg’s 3-1 win at Feyenoord, it had been a combined seven defeats in a row in the league stage of the elite competition for the Austrian side and Bundesliga side Leipzig, who are backed by the energy drink giant.

While Leipzig have faced most of their toughest opponents first – including a 1-0 loss at home to Champions League leaders Liverpool – Salzburg had lost at home to Dinamo Zagreb and Sparta Prague.

The first win at the eighth attempt came after Salzburg striker Karim Konaté scored twice at Feyenoord. He missed a hat-trick chance by hitting the crossbar with a late penalty.

Salzburg are now 30th in the 36-team standings after four of the eight rounds and Leipzig are 32nd. Only the top 24 teams in January can progress to the knockout rounds.

It was a first Champions League win as head coach for Klopp’s long-time assistant at Liverpool, Pep Lijnders.

Lijnders was at Klopp’s side for most of a celebrated nine-year spell at Liverpool, including winning the Champions League title in 2019, and his old boss will become his new boss in January.

Klopp joins the global network of Red Bull football clubs to manage the overall strategy rather than having day-to-day input on teams that include the New York Red Bulls.

The 57-year-old Klopp has that met with backlash from fans at the clubs he coached in Germany – Mainz and then Borussia Dortmund – to align with Leipzig, which was rebranded in the Red Bull group in 2009. The team is seen by most German fans as part of a corporate culture buyout success.

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