Yeah I suspect what we’re seeing is more the result of it being the first summer with a proper back room team in place trying to address the impact of 3 years of arrested development caused by a succession of personnel issues.
I think the comparisons to Feyenoord are a coincidence given Slot’s lack of involvement in buying and selling in Holland, and how untransferable the approach the building a winning side in holland is compared to in England
There were flashes of quality, more effort (even too much of it for his and our own good) and that rise in numbers in his second season. But let’s be real, there was never enough consistent progress. And it’s not only his finishing that was the problem. There is nothing misterious here for me and I don’t think he has “all the tools”. We saw everything about him and I don’t think something would’ve changed consistently for the better if a ton of these arguments and circumstances were different for him. He had 3 seasons at Liverpool, 2 different managers, different team mates around him at times, a different attacking shape, somewhat a change in style. He had a good shot here, because some were moved on even in their first season. I will not lose a second of sleep wondering what could have been. It didn’t and I don’t see any arguments why it could’ve been better enough for it to work long term.
And he can’t claim the fans didn’t have his back. I’ve never seen a player have his name chanted by the ground as readily as he did, often off the back of some appalling miss or something.
And on top of all that, the fecker is getting paid 400k to play in the Sand. Charmed life has Darwin.
Remember, you’re just going on potential. We don’t know how all these changes will pan out. Maybe in a few months, we’ll all be on Etikite’s back because he won’t cut it, Wirtz will be injured for six months, and Kerkez will commit errors and struggle to integrate. Isak, if he joins, will be have injuries anyway, as testified by his injury record.
That’s why for me, especially with Jota’s death, we needed to be very conservative in our approach, buy the reinforcements (done), but keep as many champions around as possible, until the new lads are fully integrated. Diaz (definitely not a fringe player) and Elliot are valuable players who would have been great to have around this season. There is also a case to be made for Quansah. As a fourth CB, her was largely good enough for us.
That for me would have been building from a position of strength. Again, I don’t try to convince you or anyone else, and I’ll be happy to admit that I was wrong in a few months, if things go well. But I must admit that I haven’t an overly good feeling about this summer and the coming season, contrarily to most on here. Sorry about that.
He was inches away from being the best forward on the planet that season (literally by a record number of times hitting the woodwork). I think many of us saw an hoped that an incremental improvement in his finishing and decision making in front of goal would give us a player who was an absolute joy to watch. The reality is everything went the other way for him the next season and a fresh start is best for everyone. Wish for him he got a move to a less morally compromised club, but the realty is very very few clubs are actually run by or for people who are motivated by anything other than greed.
That unfortunately does not cancel out that he was also the target of dog’s abuse.
In a crowd of 60k and a worldwide supporter base of millions, there will always be some detractors. FFS there is one turkey on here who thought we should have let Mo go a year or two ago. Darwin had a great run from fans and it’s unfair to claim otherwise
Online stuff, but I’ve never known the match support so behind a player.
Diaz was a big player and I would have loved to keep him around, however the only way that was going to happen was giving him a massive contract running well into his thirties. That was always going to be a no.
Elliot, well I don’t know what to say that hasn’t already been said. You can’t keep a lad as good as that to play the odd cup game and get a run if the two lads ahead of him get injured. We broke the British transfer record to buy a player in his position who is a year younger than him, and that’s always going to be curtains.
The fact is that not a single player has left who wasn’t either trying to get out, or was on the fringes.
I don’t share the disquiet over the amount of changes, but I’m glad Hope is giving his viewpoint. The signings we have made all need to show us what they can do in a Liverpool shirt when the real action begins.
I’m comfortable with the amount of change, as every one of them was for a good reason. We will need to see how it pans out, but I think we have made several upgrades, and if Isak and Guehi are signed, that’s two more upgrades. Bring it on.
Had we kept most of the same group together I very much doubt we would win the Premier League next time round. It needed to be refreshed and improved. I can’t wait for the action to begin again. It feels like Christmas or something!
As for Darwin Nunez, good luck to him. Didn’t quite make the grade here - it’s the finishing, innit - but he knew the love of the fans, had some moments, and now moves on. I hope he bangs in the goals again and gets another move to a good club.
Same here.
It was said on his arrival last season that this would be a transition year because of a new manager.
He then went on to win the league.
Now talk is about too many changes.
These are all standard, linear thinking.
Look at the transfers- the details of the players coming in, their roles, character, etc.
This is a very target specific recruitment by a team that clearly knows what its doing. And while there are never any guarantees, I think the concern is from inadequate understanding of what we are doing…
If you know what you are doing, you do not necessarily need the typical lead time to get it right…
100%
I want to petition that Hope needs to change his username.
TBF he doesn’t claim that it’s in his heart…
I have hope, always have. But I can’t deny that there is an uneasy feeling somewhere down there too, and prefer to be honest about it.
Yeah you should be honest and I get where you are coming from.
I agree it’s a pity Diaz is gone as he was one of our best players last season, I’d have preferred he stayed but he started pushing to leave and at that point I get why we sold him.
With Quansah. I think leaving was for the best for him. As a fourth choice he wasn’t going to develop to his potential like he might in Germany. Hopefully he’ll do well enough that we will want to sign him back later. We do need someone to replace him though.
All the best Darwin !
I think the other thing to bear in mind is that this is probably a 1 in 5 summer.
We’re putting down foundations for the next five years. This summer won’t be repeated for a while.