Mentioned Skriniar when VVD got injured and he looks good, maybe not to the extent of VVD good but from what I saw, I love a defender who can tackle without necessarily always going to the ground. He seems to be ever to get into positions to chauffeur players away from dangerous position suggesting to me he is more of a clever player rather than a robust or reckless tackler. But I also did mention that we will only invest big on a first team CB depending on how Klopp view Matip’s involvement in the next couple of seasons. He obviously thinks Matip is very important to us, and rightly so, when he was given a new contract. And despite his injuries, if he continues to think Matip will play a big role for us in the next few seasons, I do not see us investing upwards of 40mil for a CB now. But he thinks he might want to let Matip go this coming summer or thinks that his injuries is going to be a negative for us, then he might go big on a player that is first 11 material immediately.
From today’s BBC gossip column:
Lionel Messi’s father and agent has denied reports that the Argentina forward, 33, is planning to switch from Barcelona to Paris St-Germain next season. (Goal)
That’s because he’s coming to Anfield to play as our new shortarse centre half.
D’uh.
He is too short for CB. I rather we go for Cristiano Ronaldo. Has a great leap.
One mistake and he’ll get this from our new leader in defense.
RE: Janmaat rumour in Twitter thread.
Janmaat is an appaulingly bad player and anyone saying he would be a good option due to “experience” needs to watch some matches he plays in.
If we being him in it is pure desperation.
Janmaat it is then.
Not VVD, no Gomez.
So it’s down to Matip and Fabinho. The former is good but injured a lot, the latter is good too, not injured a lot, but injured now, unfortunately, in these congested game-every-other-day times.
Phillips and Williams it is then. And Milner might be able to do a job there, though the height makes us vulnerable to aerial attack.
Then Koumetia might get bumped up to a dead rubber game or two.
Then after that, I would be open to Janmaat.
Basically it’s a nope from me. I’d rather give our fringe players the experience, and what we’ve seen so far from Philipps and Williams has been promising… obviously not enough for a long term partnership or solution, but interspersed with whoever is above them in the pecking order it can see us through to January, when Upamecano can come in, or whoever… but I think we need to go big.
I think after Matip, Fabinho, Phillips and Williams we’ll look to go as follows:
Plan H: Wijnaldum
Plan I: Robertson with Tsimikas at LB
Plan J: Henderson
Still plenty of letters in the alphabet for more plans to emerge! Hadn’t thought of Wijnaldum there, but he is decent in the air.
Stylistically, strikers often foul defenders when competing for a high ball… arm on the shoulder, a push here and there, that sort of thing. Only occasionally is it called by the ref, so defenders need to be strong. We could be in for a bumpy ride for a couple of months if we can’t get some heft back there, but I think we will manage, just, until January, when I expect us to go big.
If the one we want isn’t available, even at a premium, we might go for an out of contract old arse.
Only 11 more fixtures to navigate before the next window opens.
Only.
I think there is a trend in football over the last decade or so of teams some what outsourcing a lot of their recruitment efforts to agents, and the result is you get 2 or 3 players in each position who are just accepted as the best available player that every team in Europe gets linked to. He strikes me as being in this group of players, and I’m always skeptical of those guys. Even if they are good it seems the ubiquitous interest tends to drive up their cost beyond what they are worth.
Fingers crossed Fabinho gets back soon.
Nat isn’t a bad option and Williams can do Europe for us until January but yeah we need to sign someone.
Luckily we’ve currently come out of that well.
Problem as always with this is if Matip stays fit.
Who would have thought our most injury prone CB will be the only fit CB we’ll have at some moment.
I like the idea of Henderson there, we lose his energy from midfield but if Thiago is fit that’s offset with pure dirty football.
You pair Hendo with Phillips or Matip for their aerial ability and rotate with Fabinho.
The other option is sweeper keeper and just out score the opposite.
Do you mean play Allison as a sweeper-CB and Adrian in goal?
Don’t be crazy man…
Hendo/Gini as wingbacks.
I call it the Flying LiverBird.
Me, crazy… 
I don’t see us panicking and bringing in Janmaat. There’s a reason he’s available mid way through a season.
Phillips and Williams lack experience but know how we play and what’s required. By the time Janmaat is up to speed the window will be open.
I believe we probably looked at CB in the summer but the opportunity to get Thiago was too good to turn down and we seemed a lot thinner for cover out wide and at left back than we did at CB. I’m sure we’d have been looking at one for next summer anyway so perhaps we just bring that forward one window.
But it won’t be a stop gap. It’ll be someone that would challenge Gomez and Matip, perhaps even with an eye on replacing Joel over the next 12-18 months as his availability is becoming such an issue.
But, with doing it in January I highly doubt it’ll be anyone at a club in the CL currently because those players don’t get bought easily. Rules out the Upamecano, Konate, Kounde, Schuurs etc.
Kabak and White seem the obvious choices for us to revisit given we seem to have had previous interest. I suspect Kabak would be the easier and cheaper of the two.
Or, we look at who Leipzig would replace Upamecano or Konate with and go to our old pals Salzburg for Jérôme Onguéné. Not that I’ve seen more than YouTube videos of him but he seems to be one of the next in line to make that move.
Whatever happens though, we won’t be panicked into bringing in some jobber like Janmaat. If it’s Phillips and Williams between now and Xmas then so be it. We may need to shift someone on to help facilitate a deal so I’d bet Origi is being hawked around Europe as we speak.
I don’t know if it would help us, but there’s a chance Leipzig and/or Ajax could be out of the CL by then.
What was plan G?
And don’t come at me all ol Skool mofo, ya hear?