Wouldn’t take a lesser role with us, ok fair enough. We had our man already. No matter who Liverpool have upstairs it is inevitable that they will experience a big downfall over the next few seasons. Klopp is simply too big a part of their furniture for them to not crumble when he leaves.
Michael Edwards close to making return to LFC
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They were competing with City every other year. Thats good.
They have Salah/VVD ageing. Apart from them they have Allison/Konate/TAA. Everyone other than those can drop off. Most are system players.
See that doesn't mean anything. They're good players. Get a good manager and they'll continue to be good players
Replacing VVD and Salah will be the key issue, but again, they are at a level where they can pick almost whoever they want. It's now just a matter of the players being available
Well actually thats not true.
Which player has Liverpool signed in the last few years who they would have had difficulty to attract before.
They signed Salah/VVD/Allison before their success. And any signing they made after their success aswell haven't been stars. (Thiago aside)
They chased Bellingham for years and when he moved he moved to Madrid.
For the very very top player Madrid/Barca(?)/Bayern/City have their pick. For everyone else its fair game anyway. Generally not a problem attracting them as much as affording and finding them and then grooming/integrating them.
Is his role then more like what Blancs is to us than what Ashworth would be?
I read his role is CEO of football for FSG, not just Liverpool.
That's exactly right. He is their version of Blanc. CEO of the sports company that oversees everything. Would have minimal input into recruitment, scouting, youth systems, staff.
Its more an executive role. And it seems like his primary reason of return was helping FSG purchase a second club.
Alisson and VVD are both players they don't get to sign pre-Klopp. Salah, maybe
I said *almost* any player they want
And it was as much a money issue as anything. FSG will have to open the chequebook to replace Salah and Van Dijk, at least if they want to remain competitive
Bayern don't either, and neither do Barcelona at present
The point is Liverpool are at a level where they can go out and spend massive sums on a player if they need to
Now that Edwards has brought in his first coup. Slot. I'm afraid. I'm sad and very afraid.
Seems like you were right and the fans have been turning on him in the past few months.
Not quite the genius that people make him out to be. Spends £450m and the team gets worse. Thats Murtough madness.
Why did they sign two strikers? They should have signed one and replaced Diaz.
If anything, this is the craziest time to ask this question. Can you tell me how many games they've both been available for this season?
If it were phrased "why did they spend all that money on two strikers when they had other issues", it's a fair question. Big money for Isak and half of what we paid for Ekitiké for a "true" backup could've been sufficient as well if it meant reinforcements elsewhere. But those reinforcements wouldn't be guaranteed either if we'd saved £40m on a second striker. We definitely needed two strikers, as showcased by how this season has unfolded.
The way they went about their business was as if they had a transfer ban looming. It looked bizarre at the time, and even worse now.
Could have signed Guehi too but decided to try and cheap it out and sign him on the last day of the window when they had all summer and obviously weren't short of money
Lets not forget everyone was shitting themselves after that transfer window. In hindsight it's easy to criticise.
It’s not crazy because you had one striker last season in Nunez and then you had four wingers Salah/Gakpo/Jota/Diaz who could play across the forward line. Nunez only started 8 games too, so why did you feel the need to sign two strikers for big money especially with Diaz leaving?
Isak and Ekitike could do a job on the wing, but they are too massive to do that. You moved away from signing smallish nimble players, who can play wide or centrally to splash your dosh on two strikers. Thats crazy.
It is hard to foresee Leoni doing his ACL and Isak fracturing his leg/ankle. I also thought part of the sell to Wirtz was Slot having a plan for him.
I think he should have got Guehi over the line and they should have signed another RB instead of Frimpong but I think it's harsh to put a lot of blame on him. It's mostly on Slot and some poor luck.
I think he should have got Guehi over the line and they should have signed another RB instead of Frimpong but I think it's harsh to put a lot of blame on him. It's mostly on Slot and some poor luck.
Partly true, but gotta give credit where it's due, there were a few posters on here who had their doubts about Frimpong fitting our system and were questioning how we would keep both Isak and Ekitiké satisfied (which turned out to be a non-issue but we still don't know the answer).
I don't think our business or long-term succession plan has been that bad. The only misses last offseason were CB (Guehi deal was in place but fell through), DM (too much faith in Gravenberch) and perhaps LW (think the idea was that multiple players could fit the Diaz role rather than getting in a true LW). We have replacements in place for Alisson (jury still out whether he's good enough or not imo), TAA (Frimpong, but a failure already), Robertson (Kerkez) and Van Dijk (Leoni hopefully, now Jacquet), which are/were our most senior players.
I don't believe players like Mac Allister have turned to shit at this age so am hopeful that's mainly on Slot not being the right manager, but we'll see how that turns out.
Whenever one of these guys that has been built up as a never-miss transfer savant who guarantees success, has a few setbacks, the lesson always seems to be "ah guess HE wasn't so great after all", instead of "there is no such thing as a never-miss transfer savant who guarantees success".
Diaz barely started as CF and wasn't a good fit there. Gakpo isn't good enough all around, the plan for Salah was to be a full-time RW, that leaves no one at CF.
If we had only signed Isak, you'd be asking in this very thread "why did they think it was sufficient to go into the season with only one true CF?". We absolutely needed two strikers given that Nunez was sold and Jota passed away. Whether it needed to be those two and for that kind of money is a valid question, but we definitely needed two/
Disagree. Jota started 14 games and was never a full time striker. He played most of his games on the wing during his time at Liverpool, and could also play centrally. Hence, why I am saying that why didn’t you target someone who could play across the forward line rather than two full blown strikers? Gakpo wasn’t as bad last season and scored some vital goals.
Ekitike has only missed 3 games and one was through suspension this season. Obviously he’s had a terrible injury now, but it’s not like he was out the whole season before that.
Gakpo has never been good enough to be a regular starter for us in general, but agree to disagree on that one then.
Ekitiké (and even Isak) fits your description as someone who can play across the forward line imo. Not sure which "forwards" would've been (i) quality enough and (ii) available to us that we could've signed otherwise.
Don't they have another solid RB in place who also got injured long term?
They've got Conor Bradley who is okay. He's 22 and never really stood out as a particularly exciting prospect though.
Yep, Bradley.
You’ve been unlucky with Bradley’s injury too. In my opinion he’s a better fullback than frimpong. I was stunned when Liverpool signed him for RB, and didn’t see how that would work unless slot was planning to go 3 at the back
Very unlucky with the other injuries and obviously nobody could have planned for what happened to Jota.
Wirtz.. just still out of the PL is the right place for him. Bringing in Alonso as coach would be the ultimate answer
I think that’s extremely forgiving. Leoni is a youngster who wouldn’t have had an impact this season, and they knew Isak was fragile when they spent that much money on him.
The fact they didn’t sign a 6, didn’t sign an experienced CB and spent so much money in attack without providing any competition on either flank was bizarre.
It was scattergun. Even the profile of fullbacks they signed, they just weren’t right for the planning of the team, especially Frimpong.
It’s always the case in football, a sustained period of success under a top manager and a club is deemed to be “well-run”
The fact is, whatever he does, Klopp is a miracle worker and, as with Ferguson and the Glazers, the incompetence doesn’t have a shield anymore.
I suspect he's a good sporting director but not the genius he was lauded to be. The Klopp effect was very real. Famously, Edwards and co convinced Klopp that signing Salah over Brandt was the smart play. But I'm sure that dynamic went the other way many times too. Klopp was an incredible manager. I also feel that Slot bringing more of the calm and possession style to the Klopp heavy metal style was a perfect combination last year but this year is more Slot and it's not looking pretty. (On a tangent, I believe the same is happening with Amorim + Carrick)
There's a strange lack of balance in the signings for last Summer. They signed good players but Wirtz disrupts the central spine (and I don't think he's best out wide), Frimpong and Kerkez are best at wing back, and Isak will be great again but the season has never got started for him with the protracted move and his injuries. Ekitike looks class but was maybe a luxury signing.
Is this weird strategy Edwards' fault? Yes. But I do think these players will generally come good if a couple of key pieces are added in the Summer.
What's almost more impressive about Edwards and his regime is how well they sell players. That being said, the Salah, TAA and Elliott situations weren't handled well financially.
There's a strange lack of balance in the signings for last Summer. They signed good players but Wirtz disrupts the central spine (and I don't think he's best out wide), Frimpong and Kerkez are best at wing back, and Isak will be great again but the season has never got started for him with the protracted move and his injuries. Ekitike looks class but was maybe a luxury signing.
Is this weird strategy Edwards' fault? Yes. But I do think these players will generally come good if a couple of key pieces are added in the Summer.
What's almost more impressive about Edwards and his regime is how well they sell players. That being said, the Salah, TAA and Elliott situations weren't handled well financially.
I think he's quite exciting tbh. I'd be happy to plan for him as a starter if he could stay fit.
Considering how poor Konate was at the start of the season I think there is a fair chance Leoni would have had a go and Isak being fragile has nothing to do with being on the end of a poor tackle that broke his leg. It would just be bias to say that they weren't unlucky with those injuries.
Even if this were totally true, that doesn’t excuse the money spent on him and all the areas of the squad outlined that they chose to neglect in the summer. It was terrible squad building and it’s very difficult to argue that there was a coherent plan to all of it.
I think @RobinLFC fairly pointed out reasoning behind some of those misses and squad building.
Yeah, he made some decent points about the young players being lined up, but I think it glosses over just how negligent it was to go into a season with a complete lack of options at CB/DMC knowing how many games they were going to play.
Selling all the energy out of their forward line, buying two forwards who can’t play together and having to almost have total reliance on Cody Gakpo is just poor planning.
This. feck me if anyone predicted Isak to be as bad as he has been….dig out the post and I’ll give them their props. Many more, me included, predicted him to tear the arsehole out of everyone
The signings last summer had a whiff of "we're consolidating our status as a giant club" so they went balls out to sign players like Isak, Wirtz and Ekitike. I'm sure they thought how the signings would fit into and enhance the squad, but it also felt to me like a very Un-Liverpool like window, almost like they wanted to show everyone that they are one of the big powers around. Dare I say it, more of a United style window then what i associate with typical Liverpool business.
A lot of us were saying that despite being capable of naming the strongest 1st XI, their squad was severely unbalanced.
When has ‘winning the transfer window’ ever transpired into actual success.
Remember a few years ago West Ham winning the window. How well did that work out?
It was only Isak I was bothered about… and thought Kerkez looked decent and could replace an aging Robertson