I really liked Vidal, right up to that moment.
1 Like
Loads of talentā¦ But I fear Nabyās injury record will keep him from fulfilling his potential with us.
Even these small niggles will slow him down and wonāt be able to show consistent good form.
For Keita itās not even an issue of performance first, itās to get him through a season without interruptions and a good number of games before we can expect any sort of consistency or performance from him. He has shown flashes but such stop start to his seasons, I think we are just managing his fitness as much as we can, because we Cannot get a good price for him anyway, so we might as well managed his fitness and every match he plays will be a bonus to us until he either gets over his injury problems or his contract runs out
2 Likes
I donāt necessarily buy the news stories of Keita acting pricey about his proposed contract extension but I do believe we would have opened negotiations about it.
I still wonder about offering a contract extension to him. I mean I understand that itās so that we donāt lose our negotiating position in sale talks, but isnāt it a little dicey? What if he gets injured again or never lives up to his potential? We would then have a player we canāt move taking up a spot and wages. I would love to see the cost-benefit analysis for this.
2 Likes
No point letting him leave for free and spending a fortune replacing him.
If it were any other player I would agree. But his injury history has been extremely sketchy. My worry is that we agree a contract extension with him and he gets injured repeatedly meaning he never achieves the type of form we would need to gain some benefit out of him - either in his contribution on the field or a decent sale value.
I donāt know the answer but it looks risky from the limited information thatās available. I mean heās hardly likely to agree a 1 or 2 year extension, it would have to be at least 3 years. So if he doesnāt do much on the pitch then we would be stuck with him until 2026.
1 Like
Thereās only sense in offering a contract to protect the value of a player if thereās actually some value to protect. At the moment he canāt be worth more than about half of what we paid for him and heās on a decent wage too. He wouldnāt be difficult or expensive to replace at all given what heās giving us right now. You would hope the club would wait until we see his level of contribution this season before making any move to renew a contract.
2 Likes
He didnāt look particularly interested, during the first half against Norwich and was hooked at half time. Was he injured? I donāt know, but I donāt think heās in any position to dictate to Klopp, what his role in the team should be.
1 Like
The trouble is Keita doesnāt do minor injuries. This will keep him out for a month.
I really dont see the point of a new deal. He cannot put a run together. Let him run contract down and then be someone elses problem.
I agree with someone who said he has the same mental issues as Sturridge when it comes to being injured
1 Like
Is anyone buying him though when he is always injured?
CLubs are very picky now - look at Wilshire and Sturridge - clubs have finally given up on buying an injury prone player and hoping he comes good for them.
For all we knowā¦ Due to his stop/start injuries, Keita and his agent may have stumbled upon the perfect ploy to get exactly what they want from his contract running downā¦ Is it purely playacting now on the injury front in order to manoeuvre the club into second guessing what Keita and his agent are arming themselves withā¦?
Just a thought is allā¦
To date though, the guy has contributed zero effort on winning silverware for LFCā¦!
Heās a complete waste of time. This canāt be a unique situation, so the club will know how to best deal with it I reckon. The sooner heās gone the better as far as Iām concerned.
2 Likes
I am not sure that renewing Keitaās contract would be top of the priority list. Firstly, he still has 2 years to go in his contract. If he has been a first team mainstay, the club would be pulling all stops by now. But he is not, for the last few years, he is at most considered a squad player considering his injuries. But yet even as a high potential squad player, we would have been interested to extend his contract but his injury record mean its more advantageous for the club to wait another year and see how this season goes. If he can get through this season with minimal interruptions then we can start negotiations. If not, he would have only one year to go by then and if someone is willing to offer around 15mil for him, we would let him go or we will just manage his fitness until his contract runs out. In short, there is absolutely no reason for us to renew his contract now.
1 Like
Maybe actually read up on all the other comments before posting?
Iām not sure I should comment on this. I still donāt know what Kieta could offer us. Itās just fits and starts and dissappearing from what I have seen. Even how we signed him seemed completely bonkers to me. Iāll just shut up now until I have something remotely positive to say about him.
2 Likes
Tick tock tick tock tick tockā¦
I donāt think positivity is necessary, but at least being informed. Again, his injury record prior to us has been rather good.
I feel he might just be a victim of expectations, especially given that heās wearing the No. 8. For most of his games for us thus far (except the Real Madrid one), heās been mostly quite decent at least. Considering the level of our midfield, itās not a small accomplishment. I have a feeling that JĆ¼rgen sees it this way too, and the other strengths that he brings, like his ability to carry the ball well, or get a good shot in, are really just bonuses on top of the responsibilities that our midfield has. His price tag and the manner of his transfer also serve to inflate expectations. Considering that we bought him the summer when transfer prices took an additional leap into insanity, I would say his transfer is more or less comparable to Wijnaldum. In terms of how he plays when he gets on the pitch, Iād say heās at least as good as what Wijnaldum had for us. If he had a little better luck, then perhaps the story might be wholly different.
EDIT: The part about being informed wasnāt targeted at you directly @Flobs
1 Like
Rather than all the conspiracy theories and Express articles (is there any difference between the two?) I think itās far more likely that the club are being extremely cautious with Naby in order to avoid the kind of lay offs we have seen with him over the last few years.
I think Klopp knows he an extremely talented player but will need nursing and managing for a while to get him to a point that they are confident he can play consistently.
It strikes me as similar to how the Toronto Raptors dealt with Kawhi Leonard. For those who donāt know Leonard is one of the best players in the NBA but he suffered terribly from injuries for the San Antonio Spurs who would rush him back from injury and play him until he got hurt again. The Raptors got him and took a different approach. They managed his nightly minutes, dropped him completely from certain games - especially back-to-back nights. Leonard even looked irritated about it (as Keita has at times this season) when he was pulled early in a game.
Long story short, after a lot of media criticism and questions about āWill Leonard ever be fit to play?ā, The Raptors finally got him to a stage of fitness where they trusted him to play ever single game. Over the second half of the season he played the best basketball of his life and led the Raptors to their first ever NBA Championship and everyone forgot about the first half of the season and history was rewritten as being a slam dunk free agency pick up or that Toronto somehow āboughtā a Championship.
Anyway, do I expect Keita to have the same impact as Leonard and be our best player on the way to the league title? No. However, I do think he can be a very important part of our team and that Klopp knows it too. When heās fit and firing heās by far our best attacking midfield player, and Iām not even listening to other opinions on that, he is by a mile. Theyāre going to try and manage his body, plan his minutes and if he feels something, anything, theyāre going to take him off and rest him up. Then, when we have nursed him back to fully fit and confident - and that could be months of careful management - he can have an extended run in the side.
We can either do that or we can take the Roy Hodgson approach and tell him to do sprints until he breaks down.
Moral of the story is: injury prone players can be turned into not-injury-prone players with good minute management and the media donāt have a clue what theyāre talking about they just repeat what fans are saying. Ignore them.
10 Likes
What an overreaction 
1 Like