1: But how will selling him and bringing in replacement player/players actually end up saving us money in wages? That’s the argument I don’t get.
2: We have the best player in the world so he’s the best player at the club. Players aren’t going to expect wage parity with him, players here or new signings. It doesn’t do any harm to our wages. If anything it’s a sign that you can come here, play at a great club, making loads in endorsements because of the league profile, get decent wages, play exciting football for a world class manager who’ll improve you and if you become a best in the world type you’ll be elevated to that kind of wage. It’s a motivator for existing and new players.
3: I know it won’t be a straight up replacement that’s why I listed someone like Haaland as an option. But it’ll be someone.
4: Salah and Trent are the main providers of goals and chances in the squad you aren’t just losing the goals he scored but impacting on the goals others score. It can be achieved but it will be disruptive, a lot will change and it’ll probably require significant investment and some more of our current players being sacrificed to make room to bring in multiple players to, between them, replace his contributions.
1: But how will selling him and bringing in replacement player/players actually end up saving us money in wages? That’s the argument I don’t get.
You genuinely don’t understand that? Wow!
Assume for the sake of the example that Salah is asking for £X a week in his new contract. How that would be structured is irrelevant, base rate/add-,ons etc.
So you sell Salah and buy a new player who you pay less than £X
Each week you will be saving some amount of money a week.
That’s basic maths.
Plus you then don’t get Mané asking for £X a week. Or maybe you do and then you are faced with the same situation.
EDITED because apparently it was too difficult to understand with example numbers included.
That’s just wishful thinking. If he gets a 300,000-400,000 cheque per week, it will set a precedent. Salah himself is rumoured to be using De Bruyne’s contract as a benchmark. Of course there are going to be players who will seek parity.
There’s no actual way of knowing he’s asking for that that’s speculation. There’s no guarantee we can sign a player with wages that are half Salahs but you also need to add on signing bonuses and agent fees etc too. Then there’s the fact there is no practical way we can sell Salah, keel the rest of the squad as is, bring one player in and be fine replicating our form. It’ll take multiple upgrades across more than one position.
Anyone who is thinking they can come into Liverpool as a new signing and demand parity with Salah, a best in the world contender, can get those wages elsewhere and still demand them of us even if Salah isn’t on those wages. We don’t operate in a vacuum.
As has been stated to you many times, we can’t replace Salah. We could use the money to buy upgrades in midfield and then a younger striker or 2 that we can develop. No one wants that to happen but it’s an alternative that isn’t difficult to understand.
We just did it just a few years ago with Coutinho.
Yeah but it wasn’t as difficult to replace what Coutinho was providing, in fact we kind of already had as we had 4 great choices and the first 3 were providing as many team goals between them when Coutinho wasn’t on the pitch as we scored when he was.
So in your example (which I agree and have said is what will need to happen) it’d go something like this;
Say Luis Diaz comes in to play the left, Mane slides over to the right. Some of Salahs goals and assists replaced not all. So then we add a CF to get more goals from there, say Vlahovic who seems available and in red hot form. That might improve the goals from that area (but might not because Firmino and Jota are doing good when played there) so let’s assume that increase replaces a few more of Salahs goals and assists. Then we upgrade Origi who seems off, let’s say Azmoun as we’ve been linked in the past he scores a few and he’s free this summer. That’s a few more of Salahs goals replaced by improving our bench options. Then finally we add someone like Florian Wirtz to increase goals from midfield and bam. Salahs goals and assists replaced fine.
Problem 1; We’ve now got too many attacking players so someone needs sacrificing.
Problem 2; You’ve got 4 sets of signing fees and agent fees to recoup.
Problem 3; You’ve got Salahs requested wages, Origis and anyone else sacrificed to pay these 4 new players, that may mean we save a bit but it’s thanks to other players being sold to add to the Salah saving not just saving on Salahs wages.
Problem 4; There has been significant changes in set up and personnel we aren’t going to be performing smoothly for a bit, we know in the league we have to be near perfect start to finish so it could potentially harm our chances of competing in the League that year, due to be Klopps penultimate as things stand.
Problem 5; How much are we selling Salah for? Those 3 realistic possible young signings would likely cost over £200 million. Even if Salah, Firmino, Ox and Origi all moved on we might not recoup that much in sales?
The only one close to Mo’s current level of influence was VVD before his injury. He might have a case for his final contact if he gets back to that level
It’s illogical if the person saying it thinks the response to moving him on is Haaland, or maybe even on the next tier down like Vlahovic. It isn’t if they think the solution is going for a player of the stature or Jota, or even the version of Mo himself that we signed. I think most fans will be in the former camp, whereas the club would almost certainly be in the latter.
I find it illogical this belief that we can replicate the improvement of Salah and Jota. Our best two examples of improvement out of 19 senior transfers under Klopp. What if the player we buy replicates Keita or Shaqiri instead? Or even Fabinho or Robertson taking awhile to settle and get up to speed? The points dropped during that first half a season could put paid to the chances of competing for the title that season. Then we add that most suggestions people are putting out aren’t even hitting the performance levels Salah was before we bought him so we are actually wanting a bigger improvement anyway.
Obviously. But if Salah were to get such high wages, what would stop Van Dijk for asking the same for instance? Or TAA who is yet to enter his prime and is such a creative force from the RB position?
The point is that the idea that no one else would seek wage parity with Salah is unrealistic. Sooner or later other top players are going to demand what other top players are getting.
So you will say something will work in a confident and quite patronising way but when questioned how won’t discuss further and just insult instead? Nice.
And they’d have to earn it, like Salah does, to justify it. We want players to think it’s worth becoming the best in the world at Liverpool don’t we? Otherwise any time any player gets close or fancies their chances of getting there they’ll be hitting a glass ceiling and need to move on or choose a different destination than us when we want to buy them.
Well, at some point we have to or give up. It doesnt meaningfully change the challenge whether we do that now or in 4 years because even if Mo’s output goes down in that time, to remain competitive we have to replace this version of him than the older slower version. So really the questions are can we afford what he wants now and is the person we’re identifying available now?
I didn’t say anything would work. I said it could be an alternative. You response was pure fantasy so doesn’t make any sense to answer.
Anyway, hope he signs soon then we’ll all be happy!