Some valid points here for sure. I guess the counter argument is the fees we might have got for some of them by letting the go a year or two earlier might well have been worth more to us than those last two years and then having to fill the hole they’ve left rather than transition when the right replacement is available.
Take Robbo as an example. Great value we got from that deal and him as a player. One of the best value transfers ever done. But had we looked to move him on a couple years ago we’d have got a decent fee for him and we knew we needed to replace him soon anyway.
More worrying than those older players are those that do carry value. How do we let Trent and Konate walk away for nothing? Neither had a great final season with us and combined that’s probably £150m worth of talent. Halve that for being in the last year of contracts and it’s £75m to reinvest into those positions.
But the finances aside it’s the consistent gaps it creates that really irks me. We’re forced into the market for those positions in the windows where these guys are walking away. We can’t not buy a right back last summer so we’re over a bit of a barrel in terms of negotiating position and what’s available in the market. It was right back last summer, CB and wing this summer, it’ll be CB and probably LB next summer and CM the one after that with the way things are looking with Mac.
It might be part of their plan but then at the same time we’re giving big extensions to Gravenberch, Szoboslai and Gakpo only to be happy to flog one of those a year later. And then talk is midfield will be our focus next summer even though we’ll need two CB’s and a left back based on current contracts.
It’s just very muddled and I can’t think of another club who have been so comfortable seeing so many players leave for nothing.
I was just about to post the same, we need the no nonsense type of leaders, that lead by example and set the expectations that are required from the players in training and playing.
But are there any out there, the only one I see is Eliott Anderson, you see him giving his all and geeing players up around him.
I think its not just an attempt to save money but also ease the demands on recruitment and avoid much of the volatility we are seeing. Building the quality of player coming from our youth/ academy system and also building a pipeline of talent that sits between first team and the youth sides will hopefully open the door to much smoother squad transitions.
Oh, this goes without saying. Unfortunately, I think that everything in modern football is dictated by money. How I wish we had the quality in numbers of Man City’s or Chelsea’s U21 teams - that would have surely helped with post-Klopp transition. Thankfully, it seems that U16 generations are brimming with talent (according to people in the know at least) but these things take time (and luck with injuries, something our best kids don’t seem to have, unfortunately).
Something I find myself saying a lot is that if we want to (to use the old saying) let their legs go on someone else’s pitch, by definition that means selling them before their legs have actually gone. They are probably going to do alright for another team for a bit, and we have to be OK with that.
As fans we tend to want to have our cake and eat it too. We want to get big fees for players that can be reinvested, but we also don’t want to see players go that are still contributing.
Luis Diaz is a good example of this. Wonderful player, but we let him go for big money at 28 rather than give him a new deal that would have taken him through to about 33/34. I’m sure part of that analysis is that as a forward player who relies on explosivity and energy, he wouldn’t have much in the tank past thirty. But you can’t wait until there is nothing left in the tank and still expect to get a big fee. So that was a move that more or less what you are arguing for - player at the end of their peak years, moved on while we can still get a good fee. I don’t think you’ll find many fans who think that was a good move (personally, I think it was - but it would have looked a lot better had we actually replaced him)
I generally agree that the club need to tighten up on contracts to protect itself from Bosmans, but I also think the list in that form doesn’t consider that there is a story behind each one, that makes it not as simple as it’s presented. Two of them retired. A few were continually injured and there was no market for them. A few were well into their thirties. A few the club obviously decided that another couple of years of service was preferable to selling them and banking the cash.
But more than anything else the reason why I find that list a bit annoying is that it mixes up free exits that we can have a moan about, with free exits that should be celebrated.
We didn’t get a fee for Mo Salah. He cost us £35m and became one of the best players in world, one of our greatest ever, the third highest goalscorer in our history, and left a hero. Is Mo Chatra suggesting we should have sold him three years earlier, and not won the last league title?
When you go through that list I think it’s arguable that there are just two players who fall into the category of players we really dropped the ball on and should have had a big fee for, and that’s Trent and Konate.
Yup, and both of them dragged on their transfer negotiations in supposed good faith when it’s now obvious that they were going to leave all along and were just stringing us along so that they could leave on a free.
Next time we are in a situation like this, we need to set a hard deadline, if the contract on the table isn’t signed by them, start shopping them around immediately.
I don’t think the club necessarily see that as being such a big risk though and will likely know whether they are genuinely close to an agreement or if the player will string them along (see the reporting on Konate’s exit and our signing of Jacquet for example).
Trent leaving on a free wasn’t really a problem either - we had a quality youngster ready to step up and signed an experienced option, with an existing experienced player at the club also there to cover.