NEW: Paris Saint-Germain reportedly hold an interest in Mohamed Salah, with it claimed that Liverpool may be open to selling the 30-year-old for a fee of around €80m in the summer. #lfc [calciomercato via liverpool echo]
NEW: Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain’s six-year stay on Merseyside will end this summer when his contract expires. He will not be offered a new deal, and has already been linked with a move to various Premier League clubs, such as West Ham and Southampton. #lfc [neil jones - goal]
Thank the lord, one of the better news the past 12 months.
NEW: Liverpool could look to capitalise on Juventus’ current financial situation by signing Federico Chiesa in the summer. #lfc [pete o’rourke].
Now this would be both smart and sensible…use his injury against him to get the fee down to about 20m and we’re sound.
Would be a smart move on the Juve player, just clear up that ban, Saying that when they said ban I thought it would be a year but the suggestion was a month.
It would make sense to me. He’s always been a player I’ve liked but he’ll be 32 in the summer and his injury record, despite a good recent 12 months, isn’t great.
It’s possible that he wants to move to prolong his career but my guess, from our side, is that they have identified another CB who doesn’t count as home-grown so it’s either Matip or VVD that needs to make way.
It’s what I said yesterday, perhaps it’s time to sell one of Gomez/Matip (each for different reasons) and get someone else in.
Who knows what our budget will be, also depending on what we qualify for this season and with big focus on midfield, there might not be much left for a CB.
But that doesn’t mean we can just ignore some things that are happening and see if there’s a good/better solution on the market to do it this summer.
Think both of Gomez and Matip will move this summer infact we’ll have a substanial outgoing of players in both sales and ending contracts.
Given our current position we have little choice but to make fairly significant change to the playing group as I’d hope there isnt a change in manager and it’s one or the other.
Not sure if they will attract so much interest and willing buyers.
We might have to look at out of the players we’d like to sell, what offers are out there in the first place.
Because if we sell both Gomez and Matip, we need 2 new in. And that’s without talking about 2 new midfielders.
Bringing 2 new forwards or midfielders is easier than bringing 2 new CB’s and making it work.
I as a fan would like to see us offload one of Gomez/Matip, my worry is that the club might keep both and then see Matip leave on a free in 2024 and Gomez stay until god knows when.
Dont think we have a lot of choice really. I think with some of the players we are just gonna have to cut our losses and take what we can get.
If we start next season with the same four Cb’s as this season we can kiss next season goodbye too. Gomez and Matip just arent upto it anymore. Both have had great periods for us but both have fitness issues and their beat form seems along ways away. We need at least one top Cb to go into a 3 man rotation with Virg and Ibou and then a smart deal, free agent or something for our fourth choice option. And then do the same in midfield get what we can for Fab and Thiago move Hendo into the Milner role and get at least 2 but ideally 3 new mids.
FSG have been lucky till now that they have been able to sell players to fund purchases but this summer they are fonna have to dig deep and spend some serious money if they do actually want us to bounce back next season. If were still going like this next season Klopp will be gone and likely some of the players we actually want to keep will be looking for the exit door too.
But personally I think it’s too simplistic to just say they’re over the hill or done or whatever. The WHOLE squad is having a bad patch/season apart from Bajetic. Mentally, structurally there’s so much wrong.
We’re criticising individual players who have reached 3 out of 5 champions league finals and collected over 90 points 3 times too. It’s boarder line unheard of and I just don’t believe they’re all bad players all of a sudden, cos it’s not just those two; it’s Salah, Trent, Fabinho, Henderson so either all their legs have fallen off at once at various ages and experience or there’s something else not right. But no one is convincing me that Matip or Gomez couldn’t reach high levels again or be useful players for champions league teams.
Having said that I’d sell Salah, Fab, Matip and Kostas this summer if decent offers came in because I think we’ve been poor at selling players at the right time the last couple of years. Klopp would call me an idiot for saying so though. No way they’d want to lose that many leaders and that much experience.
Maybe I’m wrong, but I don’t think that’s a coincidence. Even Robertson hasn’t been up to his usual standards this season, and that’s with plenty of rest thanks to Tsimikas.
Virtually everyone on the top of that bar Alisson has been below par individually this season.
Furthermore, that table only covers the most recent full season, so who knows what it looks like over the longer term.
To clarify I dont think any of the players have gone to shit over night I think as a club we have run them into the ground and they simply dont have the energy and desire to keep it up anymore.
We didnt replace Gini and we have held onto injury prone players to the detriment of those who where able to stay fit. And now their all cooked.
It may not be a conscious thing but maybe the players are sick of having to give 110% playing injured etc to cover for owners who dont want to spend money.
I’ll await the lecture from the expert sports physiologists here. Until that arrives, I’m just not having that the squad working hard as hell last season affects this season. Takes me a few days to get over a tough match, the effects are not there 3 months later.
