Yeah I think we sometimes overrated our own Gomez (and not only him). Doesn’t take much for lines like “best in the league/best English/best in Europe” to appear with certain players (with certain players it’s true). Heard that even about Sakho in the past, let alone Gomez. But happens at every club I guess.
He had some brilliant spells for us, namely the first part of 18/19, I remember I had specifically him and Gini as our two best players, the way they started that season. Couldn’t decide between the two who played better (possibly Gini as it’s a more all action role).
I’d say we never really spoke enough about his weaknesses, probably because he was young(er), talented, fast, could play, English, etc. An Englishman surnamed Gomez, that’s the full package! Even when his form was ‘alright’. Some things were always evident and Klopp spoke about them here and there.
We’ll see what happens, I wouldn’t write him off yet. For me, since Virg is in, I always had Matip as our 2nd best CB on paper in terms of quality when they’re fit and in normal form, but it’s not like there was a huge hole between Matip and the rest. They all had their good spells and bad spells. Sometimes form, more often injuries, sometimes both. F*ck, even Lovren had his best period early alongside Virg on that route to Kiev.
When you look at our defence now (players we count on), it’s a “perfect” situation; 8 players for 4 positions, all tied under contracts.
Doesn’t mean we might not still have an eye on the market (and the Academy!) for possible upgrades and changes, but it could happen that someone like Gomez and Williams (at some point maybe even Tsimi) want to go out and play more games. Will depend on our evaluation and offers I guess.
I’m calm about the situation, I don’t think Matip will necessarily be there for 50 games a season for the next eternity. Konate is showing some good stuff, some not so good stuff, very much a work in progress, I’d say so far so good, considering everything. But I think we bought him because he has some raw qualities and we believe we can improve him (also work on that prevention from injuries!) with time. Question about his ceiling, we’ll find that out at some point.
And if it turns out that Gomez goes somewhere else and we find the deal to be good enough to move on, that’s also a possibility.
When you have one of the best sides in Europe, things like this happen, so it’s no drama for me, as long our next moves are on point more often than not to keep us at that level.
