But that doesn’t support the narrative Klopp is shite at signing players.
We haven’t been good in the market in the last 4/5 windows, despite doing some good individual deals.
It is pure delusion to argue otherwise. You don’t end up with guys like Arthur and Endo if you have a serious, well thought out plan.
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I think this is generally interpreted as Veto power, meaning the data guys aren’t going to drop someone on him he has no use for. but honestly, that just describes a group with a functional working relationship so it’s a pretty unremarkable dynamic. It think some people have tried to turn this into a narrative, either through agenda or because of over simplification, into him being able to run rough shod over the rest of the brain trust discussing their priorities. Whether he could or not is not really known as by all accounts Klopp is happy to just be a voice in the discussion and is happy to acquiesce when others who are trusted make strong arguments to go in other directions.
That Athletic piece from last year claimed that the power balance in those discussions had changed and seemed to put that on Klopp forcing his wat more. They didn’t say it outright, but they used that to insinuate that was not what Ward signed up and so explained him walking. That seemed to me to be the point it verged into unsupported hit piece. Dynamics change over time, especially when there is personnel turn over, and what seemed to go unexamined in that piece was how much the other parts of the brain trust continued to fight their corner.
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Still was overruled? Confirming it after being convinced one player is better doesn’t make much of a difference
That’s more of an issue with the set up rather than the actual players.
Gakpo seems quite a shrewd deal as does Dias considering when we did them.
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Diaz, Nunez, Gakpo, MacAllister, Szoboszlai.
A list like that is the real story.
Melo was a low cost signing (agreed we shouldn’t have been in that position) to try to tide us over, after we realized we were short in midfield.
Endo has only just arrived. We needed a defensive midfielder. He checks that box. He is experienced, but has more miles left in his legs than Henderson and Fabinho (if they didn’t leave there’s no way we’d have singed Endo).
Let’s see what he does.
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Yeah, I misread that. Sorry.
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It isn’t the real story. We’ve failed to properly address major areas of need in the last 5 or so windows. Even this year, we quickly addressed the midfield, but then sold off two more midfielders without bringing in suitable replacements.
We’ve known since the 21/22 season that we need more quality CBs, and we have yet to address the issue properly.
I’m not an FSG hater, and I get that the investment into the stadium and other facilities means you have to be economical with transfers, but we need to get better about actually correcting major gaps in the squad.
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What story?
The story of our recruitment over the last 18 months is not that we haven’t signed good players, but that we haven’t addressed the needs in the squad.
When we suffered 4 midfield injuries last year early in the season, we turned to Arthur Melo as the solution. Caicedo, Mac Allister, Douglas Luiz and Enzo Fernandez were all looked at that summer and decided against.
We needed a defensive midfielder this summer, and Wataru Endo has been the solution. I’m all for the sunny takes and giving him a chance, but he is only here because we were woefully unprepared.
I don’t think Nunez and Gakpo being signed is evidence of a well thought out plan, either. We’ve signed Nunez without seemingly knowing how to play him. Gakpo has been converted to a ‘9’ because Nunez apparently isn’t the type of player we want, and Gakpo has looked poor as a winger and midfielder.
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I think the Nunez point is a very good one.
Regardless of what anyone thinks about him as a player I don’t think there’s been any point where it looks like we’ve had a clear, thought out plan for him.
However I think you’re being harsh when it comes to Gakpo. Think he was brought in to give us a Firmino style option going forward, he’s had that role right from the off really and been very good at it.
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As I said, it’s hard to know what’s going on and who is responsible for what.
If you believe Klopp then the reason we ended up with Arthur was because he was happy with his options until the injuries stacked up. But maybe he was just saying that and behind the scenes he wasn’t being backed with the money to get the player he wanted, the team couldn’t identify the right player or Ward couldn’t get a deal done. We just don’t know.
But the business we have done post Edwards has been good on the whole. Anything over a 50% hit rate is above par. Early to judge the three from this summer but Szobo already looks great business.
The longer term planning is definitely a concern but whose job it is to find a Sporting Director is anyone’s guess at this point.
Saying that we haven’t addressed the needs in the squad is wide of the mark. I’ll go from front to back.
Mane and Firmino left. We signed Diaz, Nunez and Gakpo. Our needs were addressed.
Moving back to the midfield…
We had too many players on the books who were not offering anything like value for money, due to all the wages we were paying out for not a lot of return on the pitch.
This summer we cleared the decks in midfield, and we needed to.
We needed more athleticism and quality. MacAllister and Szoboszlai are well placed to be main men in our midfield moving forward.
Hendo and Fabinho left, unexpectedly. We needed a defensive midfielder. We signed one. On his own, maybe it’s understandable that some see him as underwhelming, but as part of the new trio, hopefully he will do well for us. Let’s see. And we might not be finished with midfield signings.
Defence?
At that point I am in agreement. We have a need that has so far gone unaddressed. If we don’t sign another defender, then for this season Klopp is going with VVD, Konate, Matip, Gomez and Quansah, who just saw some action. Endo can cover there too.
Personally I think we need a central defender to be ahead of Matip, with a fair chance of staking a claim in the defence for years to come.
Conclusion:
Our needs have been addressed. We have built/rebuilt the team from front to back, brought the age down, added athleticism, and got rid of loads of wasted wages.
There is still more work to do, definitely a central defender, and hopefully another midfielder.
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Our problem isn’t identifying talent, it’s deciding what the talent is worth. I don’t think that’s FSG, i think that’s Klopp and co. As seen with Caicedo, money is there to spend, we are just wary of spending too much on wrong guy/unproven etc.
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A lot of it is risk averse I feel.
He’s a similar style to Firmino but absolutely nowhere near in terms of quality or influence, he simply can’t find space like Firmino does and he doesn’t have the same intelligence. At this point he’s just a lower quality imitation.
No one can compare to peak Bobby in that role. Gakpo’s done well enough
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Definitely harsh to the extreme. Bobby had long periods where he was not effective and his passing was always suspect. A great player but I expected it to be at least a couple pf years before we convieniently forgot that he also had poor spells.
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A bit harsh on Endo too (putting him in the same bracket as Arthur)…
I believe Endo could end up being a brilliant signing but just didn’t meet our initial preference age-wise.
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Nobody is saying Firmino didn’t have poor spells, just that he was far better than Gakpo has shown so far, which is true.
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Whatever happens with this one, it is worth it for this video.
https://www.youtube.com/live/sZ5QN9amFuM?si=HJzLd9qY11BHbvyM
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