Naby KEITA: 2021/22

But he got through it, which suggests a certain level of mental toughness. :thinking:

Mental toughness cannot get a strained hamstring through a premier league game. He got through his own issues because of individualized medical care, patience and understanding.

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Milner is also out with a pulled hamstring.
Mentally weak too?

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As I said further up, Keita was fuming when sat down with the physio vs Brighton. Very much looked like he was being told he was being replaced and he didn’t want to be. That doesn’t strike me as the attitude of someone who is mentality weak about their body.

Klopp brought in a guy to basically get people like Keita fit and stay fit. Hamstring issues happen to most footballers and it was clear we overplayed Keita due to injures

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I’d hate to see how often he’d play if he wasn’t ā€˜overplayed’. Fuck me.

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They can both be true at the same time. He could have been overplayed after the first couple of injuries, that never led him to properly recovering after those, which goes back to what @Limiescouse was saying.

I can’t for one understand why people are so quick to want to get rid. Jürgen quite clearly likes him, and he usually plays when fit. And makes an immense difference too.

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It can also be that on paper it wasn’t a big risk and that shit happens, no matter how good people and specialists we have. We don’t have to find/put blame on someone in every single situation.

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It was something like 6 games in a row in the space of around 15 days, with a small break for the cup game, that’s a big workload for any player.

The problem is his contract. Its quite a high one as we expected him to be our new star midfielder when he arrived. Although he plays well when on the pitch he’s not really contributing enough to merit the contract he is currently on (even if its no fault of his own).

So what do we do? His current contract ends in 2023.

Do we extend it? Almost certainly means matching the wage he currently doesn’t justify. Probably means increasing it.

Do we let him run down his contract? Even that’s not perfect as his contract distorts other contract negotiations for extending with existing players and signing new players. Players who contribute more or are brought in with the aim of contributing more will want to be in line. Then we lose a multi million pound asset for nothing and the club haven’t been acting like we can afford to bin that kind of money these days.

So a lot of us see a sale next summer for whatever we can get being the best option. It’ll help pay for his replacement. If we wait till 2023 we still need to buy his replacement but have no help towards it from a Keita sale.

I doubt anyone dislikes Keita as a person and it’s stupid when people blame a footballer for their own injury issues, it comes from frustration but nobody suffers more than the player who gets the injuries. But realistically I think many see a sale as the clubs best option.

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If those 6 games included the Atletico game, wasn’t he hooked at half time? And against Utd, he was carried off just after half time, so he didn’t actually play 6 full games.

I think that was planned though?

Definitely not planned that one…

In all seriousness though, that’s still quite a few games in a short period of time.

playing 45 minutes is definately less load on the player than playing 90…im not doubting that…

…but it doesnt ā€˜halve’ the load. mentally and physically, starting/getting ā€˜up’ for the game is the major stress load.

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Sadly I think this will lead to many feeling disappointed with the outcome. You tend to underestimate how much Jürgen values a stable squad, and for that matter, how much of our lack of transfer activity was driven by him. At this moment, it’s probably more likely that we’ll see him get a new contract extension than him getting sold…

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I think most likely scenario is him running his contract down and moving on for free. Klopp likes a settled squad but one CM in per year over the next few hardly flies in the face of that. But what Klopp is extreme in is considering what the player wants. If its mutual that everyone thinks Keita should move on he will but if the player is adamant about wanting to stay I think Klopp accepts that. Then he runs down his contract and gets a big goodbye and thank you like Lallana. Another player too injury prone to extend but wanted to be here so wasn’t forced out.

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I for one hope he’s given a new contract. He’s too good just to allow to walk out the door for nothing.

Why not a scenario where Keita retains his current basic wage, but with higher incentives tied to appearances and performances? It looks like we are holding the cards in this situation, with the player liking it here (supportive environment and team mates) and few clubs likely to pay a high wage for him even if he leaves. The possible stumbling block could be his agent, so perhaps more money down that area then…

Didn’t Houllier send him to France to have back essentially reshaped by a specialist?

He ain’t getting that if he doesn’t contribute a fair bit more between now and then. Adam (and Gini) did a fair bit more than just run down their contracts to earn their goodbyes

You always say things like this, and accuse other people of conjecture…

The fact is that Naby Keita is a player who’s Liverpool career has been shattered by injuries, and the money available in the game, especially at the level that Naby might look to rebuild his career, is just not there. Those two things do not suggest there is a market there for Naby.

Even if you want to go full Mourinho and ā€˜make it clear’ that a player should leave, there is absolutely no point to this unless there is a place for the player to go and a result for the club in terms of income.

That doesn’t really help us though, does it? That’s virtually giving him away. You might as well keep Naby, if those are the terms.

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I think I remember Ryan Nelson playing through a match with a torn hamstring, either for his club or for New Zealand at the World Cup?