Papadopoulos on a free now.
Upamecano, he is a beast of a defender.
He’s an even bigger sicknote than Matip.
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For good reasons imo
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Dayot
Day-ay-ay-ot
Dayot Come
And fill in for Big Virg
Ok, the rhyme and meter loses its way towards the end…
Still, buy Upamecano, as soon as we can.
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I’d buy Pickford and then i’d kick his little head in.
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You’ll break even pretty quick with the number of people who’ll be willing to pay you to watch that. 
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Shocked we have to buy him for you to do that.
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I’d bet @WooltonRed may cover all expenses himself
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I’m still driving the Omar Colley trains, with £10.8 release clause. Absolute fantastic solution in January.
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Everyone has to step up now.
Hard to believe that Gomez and Matip will stay fit until January.
Bringing in someone in january is a must.
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I think we took things a gamble too far.
We gambled on VvD being an ever present, playing him every game, never rotating or resting him (something we also do too much with our first choice forwards) and we’ve been lucky he hasn’t had knocks and niggles but it doesn’t matter how tough players are eventually they will get injured. Playing them flat out just heightens the risk of something twanging or increases the number of opportunities that someone will clatter them.
This is what football is and why you don’t just have a starting 11 anymore but we took a few more gambles too that mean it’s the worst possible timing.
We gambled on Matip being fit so therefore not replacing him with a more durable player. We’ve done this a few seasons on a trot now and it’s yet to pay off. The only reason we haven’t suffered is because of the quality of others.
We gambled on Gomez being such a talent at such a young, inexperienced age. But as much as this was the right thing to do he has hit that rough patch that was almost inevitable and unfortunately it’s been awful timing.
We gambled on squad size. Klopp likes a smaller more tight knit squad but this season was always going to be a challenge due to congestion and Covid quarantine absences. We should have gone for the deepest squad we could assemble. The Hoever deal was a good one but we didn’t need to take it. We also tried to sell Philips and loan VDB but luckily for us failed on both.
We gambled on not replacing Lovren. I actually was on board with Fabinho being the in house replacement (especially as we strengthened CM so wouldn’t miss Fabinho and kept Philips as emergency cover). But with everything else Fabinho should have moved to being a CB exclusively and only emergency cover at CM. We gambled further by using Fabinho at CM still even though he was required so much at CB.
We’ve probably already got plans to bring in a CB to replace Lovren and/or Matip and only delayed them with Fabinho covering and Matip staying.
With VvD, Gomez, Matip and Fabinho we had false strength as we weren’t using Fabinho just at CB and Matip is so injury prone so we had 2 full CBs and 2 half options. Obviously now this has been blasted by VvD getting such a big injury, he was always going to get an injury at some point (we’d rode our luck big time) but we are unlucky how drastic it has been when it’s happened.
To negate the situation a bit Fabinho now surely has to be used exclusively at CB and as it stands a starter. Matip will come in and out, Gomez needs managing to make sure he’s out of his funk and doesn’t slip back in. Phillips, VdB, Williams and Koumetio means we have plenty of depth (if none reliable yet) for FA Cup and maybe dead rubbers in CL whilst the main 3 concentrate on the league and harder CL matches.
In January we need to address whatever CB we were looking to bring in and try to move heaven and earth to make it happen for us. We can still be strongish up to Jan as long as Matip is semi reliable and Gomez doesn’t suffer too bad with his form. If the new guy takes up quite well he could play his way into a starting role here. Or one of the kids might seize their moment.
Either way it’s not all doom and gloom and when you look at the mess that most of our rivals call on for their defences I don’t think this should hold us back. If possible we need to improve our 2nd Choice GK in Jan too though.
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It is difficult to respond to a comment that the decisions we have made about the make up of our squad have not “paid off” over the last two years. It’s been our most successful period for 30 years and Matip played a significant part in both seasons. Both his presence and the “gamble” to not replace him “paid off”.
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You’ve either completely misunderstood what I said or purposely misrepresented it so I will try again.
We have got away with the Matip gambles the last couple of seasons because we have great quality in our other options. If we had Skrtel and Kyrigiskos instead of VvD and Gomez missing Matip as much as we have certainly would have had a much more detrimental effect, surely you can’t possibly argue that?
All the other gambles we took are purely in reference to this year so what we have won in previous ones is immaterial anyway. But you may have also missed my finishing point?
Let’s be fair…we don’t yet know whether the gamble not to bring in a CB this summer will or will not pay off. Hopefully we won’t be able to draw any conclusion on that for some time!
I do think we need more cover there and I felt that before we lost Van Dijk but it’s possible that we could still manage. Of course we’re now extremely thin but get to January unscathed and still in contention and I think we’ll be open to making a move. Upamecano would be a great option but not the only one. I’d certainly be open to enquiring about Tarkowski and Diop (two CBs that have been agitating for moves away from Burnley and West Ham respectively). There are others on the continent that I am not familiar with but have seen a number of positive articles about when linked with other clubs during the summer.
Tell me again how I misunderstood or misrepresented you. If I am required to read something later in your post that makes a different point that negates what you’ve said here so that I should infer you are making a different point, then the issue is not with my understanding of your post.
You dont make your point any stronger either by suggesting that it wouldn’t have paid off if we had shitter players than we actually have.
Every year Matip has been here we have gambled on his fitness record and thought he would be fine so have not replaced him. He’s a great player so we have taken that chance but every season so far we have lost on that gamble because he has missed significant playing time denying us him being available. Maybe you and I don’t use the words in the same way? But I see that as completely separate from what the team is or isn’t able to achieve which was the point you make. You seem to think the gamble is whether or not Matip being injured effects us winning things which isn’t what I said. I said we took a gamble on him being fit. Us winning a title whilst he spent a significant part of the season injured doesn’t somehow mean he was fit.
We didn’t gamble on Matip, we gambled on Fabinho stepping in and playing CB when needed. Which is what will happen now.
It’s why we bought a central midfielder (when we are stocked in that area), when a player like Thiago becomes available you sign him, you tweak your squad to do so. That was knowing Fabinho would play more games at CB - Thats the tweak.
My view is in Jan we bring forward the signing we were going to do next summer, be that Upamecano or another. Paying a premium to do so. Or we get surprised by everyone and Billy plays more.
We put a squad together with the intention of winning stuff. Not only did we win stuff, we did so with Matip playing a significant role. Whatever other criteria you are personally using is not particularly important and quite frankly it comes across as you belligerently defending the position you staked out 2 years ago and again last year regardless of the actual outcome.
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I pointed out this as two separate gambles. Gambling on Matip being fit and gambling on Fabinho covering CB despite us not stopping him from starting at CM.