I think there are two issues to bear in mind with M’Bappe and Real Madrid/the fee.
Real Madrid are a fucking mess. Like on the brink of catastrophe. I don’t think they could afford the spend £80m, and M’Bappe isn’t an idiot. It’s not going to be a good few years at the Bernabau.
It’s well known that it’s his dream to play for Madrid, but he is only 22 and he could spend a few years with us and go there at 26/27 by which time they might be in a better position to take him. We’ve got a track record for facilitating those kinds of moves.
As for the fee, I think he is such a marketable and potentially ceiling shattering personality that FSG would just find the money. FSG would be using him to push the club into the top 10 global sports brands, and we’d be facilitating him positioning himself as a superstar. We won’t break our wage structure to sign him, but we can probably sit down with him and work out how LFC can help him earn a lot more than that through endorsements and partnerships.
Are we still going on about how shit we have been for 30 years?
We are on par with the best teams in Europe, we’ve had issues this season but considering how bad some teams go when they lose one player losing 4 for most of the season with more injuries aside shows how much quality and desire there is in our team.
You come to Liverpool now and you expect we will be challenging.
I agree with you. But with M’Bappe it’s not just that. It’s how he positions himself as footballs LeBron James or Michael Jordan. There are a handful of clubs that can give him that. City and Chelsea are not among them.
Fact is if Mbappe is going somewhere this summer then that’s the important bit… he’s going SOMEWHERE!
It seems a very shallow pool of places he, as a professional athlete wanting a good sporting home, would go to. It seems an even shallower pool as to which of those clubs could actually hope to bring him in.
I think if the rumours that the Redbird money will be used to write off the Covid losses of this season and last are true we are in a unique situation.
Based on projected finances for 2021/22 financial year and season (which this summers spending will come under) and vast majority/all of the outgoing payments for 2017/18 & 2018/19 now being paid and cleared IF we don’t have the covid losses as an anchor round our neck we can do it. We should already have around £50m a year in outgoing payments cleared, works out at £150m or £200m over a 3 or 4 year deal. That’s where I think the rumours of this year being eyed as a big year come from.
Make no mistake though we currently have a bloated squad and a significant number of the playing staff only have 2 years left on their deals. Room will need to be made to bring him in both for his wages and extensions for the likes of Alisson, VvD, Fabinho and Henderson and whoever stays out of Salah, Mane and Firmino.
I don’t see us able to keep all 4 of our main forwards and add Mbappe. But I can see one making room. Possibly even 2 and Sancho also brought in if we have the opportunity.
It sounds like fantasy football but at one point so did VvD for the price he cost and the summer when we added Alisson and others.
Van Dijk from Southampton didn’t really sound like fantasy football. We had the Coutinho money. Alisson was a nice catch, considering some others were sniffing. But he also came with a season and a half from Roma.
Mbappe is not comparable to those, that’s a level above. At least. He’s one of the best players in the world, already playing at a rich club, titles under his belt, world champion, probably the leading “young” player in the world.
But at the time we were desperate for a defensive commander. Right now we aren’t desperate for any type of attacker. Why would we give Gini a guard of honour and not do the same for any of our 3 forwards if we have plans to move them on?
It’s true the club have thrown a few surprises our way over recent years, but signing a £200m player and discarding any of the 3 much-loved forwards would certainly be the biggest one yet.
Real want to raise the funds for Mbappe by selling Hazard. They have said they will listen to offers but they wont get half of what they paid as he has been a disaster. That said, Chelsea love buying old players back a few years older and double the price so maybe theyll get £100m from them!
I’m going to be honest and say I would rather keep Salah - a player already integrated into the country, town, playing group, scoring 20+ goals every year, than take on the astronomical risk of signing a forward for £200m+ for twice the weekly wages who has never lived in the country.
If it’s a choice between Salah and Mbappe, I would sell Salah.
Love Mo, and his goals have been the difference for us. A slight gripe… he looked like he was playing for the golden boot yesterday, and not the team, as on a few occasions there was a simple square pass on to a teammate in a better goal scoring position. Strikers are generally greedy by profession, and we won 2-0 and the season finished on a high note, so no need to overdo it on Mo, I suppose!
Still, Mbappe for Mo? Sign me up.
Obviously I rather have both Mbappe and Salah, even if it meant selling Bobby and/or Sadio.
I think he gets far too much of this flak. We wouldn’t be in the top 10 without him this year, and his thirst for goals is what has made him so reliable since he first pulled on a red shirt. All the best strikers are the same
But I back my general point. I acknowledge all great strikers are greedy, and I acknowledge without Mo’s goals we’d be in a mess, especially this season with other strikers off form.
And still, in light of all that, I thought I was watching a player who was tilted too far in the direction of playing for the golden boot.
Van Dijk was more than 150% of the World Record signing for a defender and came close to doubling our club record.
Alisson was a third again the world record for a keeper and obliterated any records we had of signing a keeper at that stage. He also happened in an extremely high spending summer for us when we spent around a £150m net.
Mbappe may be available £130m or less. He’s not even in top 3 most expensive attackers.
As towards money it may not all come from one player like Coutinho but I expect a lot of sales.
I think we keep Salah no matter who we decide to bring in.
He is amongst the really top players in Europe at the moment, so why contemplate selling him.