I can’t speak for every club, but many clubs in the PL have chosen to loan money to cover their covid losses. I’m sure we could have done that, but then I’m not looking at this squad and seeing a desperate need to spend money plugging holes that aren’t there. Arsenal may have spent £150m, but they are not an advert for his to run a football club.
I don’t think there is a chance in hell if Klopp and Edwards went to FSG saying they need a player and they have identified the right one, FSG don’t pony up the cash.
And how’s that working out for them? For many it seems the act of spending the money is more important than continuity in a squad. I would have liked another signing myself but going through our squad I can understand why we kept our powder dry. We have a style of play, world class talent from goalkeeper to striker and solid options in the squad from goalkeeper (Kelleher, not Adrian) to forward and a settled and brilliant management team. All better than fucking Arsenal.
Couldn’t agree more. That is true of many modern football fans, not just Liverpool ones; I blame both Sky, with their frenzy around transfer deadline day, and, to a lesser extent, Football Manager.
To paraphrase Bob Paisley it is not about the cheap player or the expensive player; it is about the right player.
True. The default stand has become that owners and managers are always in a state of dispute and want different things. It has become a norm with the managers these days coming out in open and stating they were not supported by the owners on the transfers etc etc. and the owners like Abramovic treating managers like commodities. Maybe for us FSG and Klopp are in sync on what they want and what is feasible.
Still find it difficult to believe that the super league was kept so quiet…
Surely the grapevine of gossip and news was awash with rumours.
Overnight it could have changed Jurgens job description and may even have invalidated his contract… How could FSG be so sure he wouldn’t have walked due to such duplicity…!
It is the one thing I can never fully forgive FSG for… Who is to say there is not something else up their sleeve to spring on us at some future juncture
And still you forget that in 2 of the last 3 seasons the club made net profit from transfers of around 50 mln. pounds.
And there are renewals, but also several players left the club and it means less money for wages -
Shaqiri, Wijnaldum, Kabak, Wilson, Grujic.
New players and new contracts:
Konate is on 90 000 pounds per week.
VvD - with a pay rise of 40 000 pounds /from 180 000 to 220 000/
Alisson - with a pay rise of 60 000 pounds /from 90 000 to 150 000/
TAA - with a pay rise of 105 000 pounds /from 75 000 to 180 000/
Fabinho - with a pay rise of 80 000 pounds /from 100 000 to 180 000/
Henderson - no payrise - 140 000 pounds per week
Robertson - with a pay rise of 50 000 pounds /from 50 000 to 100 000/
Kelleher - with a pay rise of 10 000 pounds /from 5000 to 15 000/
Philips - with a pay rise of 30 000 pounds /from 30 000 to 64 000/
That is around 450 000 pounds more the club are paying for wages per week.
But at the same time:
Wijnaldum was on 90 000 pounds per week.
Shaqiri was on 80 000 pounds per week.
Kabak was on 65 000 pounds
Grabara and Woodburn were both on 17 000 per week combined
Taiwo, Grujic and Wilson - three of them will be at least 70 000 pounds combined.
This means that the club has freed at least 300 000 pounds for wages. So our wage bill has grown with 150 000 pounds per week and that is around 7 mln. pounds per year.
As I said the club has once again finished the transfer window with a net profit of around 10 mln. pounds.
Chelsea net spend the last 5 seasons is apparently ‘only’ £26.6 m per season which is a surprise to me.
Whereas the Manchester clubs net spends are just insane, as has been Everton’s.
Our net spend over 5 years is 18.5m which is lower than the likes of Brighton and Bournemouth.
Amazing job being done by Edwards and Klopp when you look at the figures.
You surely watched the game midweek? City are without a really top striker and so Jesus is the main man, United have good options but nothing much behind them, Spurs have not got all the depth in world up front, neither do Leicester, Chelsea are an injury away from relying on Werner again and Arsenal are fucked even though they spent all that money.
We have Mane, Salah, Firmino with Jota as the main rotation/competition. That is far more depth up front than pretty much anyone else except for United. I’m not sure if this is a recent phenomenon where back ups, insurance policies and redundancies have become the norm to mitigate risk but in football there is only so much you can do and only so many players you can have in a squad. There was comment a few weeks ago when Taki was injured in international duty about it being too bad the window was closed and not being able to sign a replacement. I mean, replacement for the replacement of the replacement?
That’s the attitude that prevails; plug and play options. Mo gets hurt, have someone to replace him with no dip in quality, of that person gets injured then we must have another person ready to step in without any drop in quality and if that person gets injured then the 3rd/4th/5th choice must be ready and in place to step in without any drop in quality. It’s simply not possible for us and even richer clubs struggle with it because players aren’t robots. Here is our squad with Milner providing the back up of the back ups in the case of emergencies:
GK: Ali, Kelleher, Adrian
RB: Trent/Nico/Milner
CB: VVD/Matip/Gomez/Konate
LB: Robbo/Kostas/Milner
That squad is more than capable of winning a title this season. Exactly a year ago that side, with the exception of Elliot, was an outstanding bet to win multiple titles but that same side this year isn’t? Last year was an aberration. An anomaly that saw not only our players injured but also injured at the same time ranging from mid to long term. Would I gave lkked another signing bar Konate, yes. Can I also see why there wasn’t. Yes.
thats not the point. infact if anything, its even more depressing.
imagine what we COULD have done with that money outlay?
and ruthlessly, it emphasises the issue more…imagine if the Arse spent that kind of coin while at the top of the cycle…instead of spending it now, playing catch up…
the more you think on it, the more youve made your own counter point…
I’ve actually said the same thing on TIA. This team had just won the CL and then the title and I said that. When the argument was about whether or not Thiago would be a possibility I also argued that this was the point where we can realistically view ourself as the destination and not the stop to make yourself before going on to the destination and that we can look at getting players like Thiago. That has not changed and what is not being realised is that we did spend big, for us, when we were at the top last year when we brought in Thiago and Jota.
So we have done that. As Bob said courtesy of @cynicaloldgit it’s not about the cheap player or the expensive player, it’s about the right player. We can imagine spending like Arsenal did but what’s the point if it’s the wrong players. We were hampered last season by unprecedented injuries and empty stadiums, not through a lack of squad building.
Well not really, because the issue at top of the cycle Arsenal was the not paying of higher wages to their best players and then seeing them leave to clubs who would do.
