It’s a shame Sepp seems to have as many concerns with injuries as the rest of centre back options.
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The need for a new CB has just gone up another notch with this news.
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I don’t think he was going to stay with us next season, so I think nothing changes.
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I don’t know how we are going to replace Sepp’s minutes without a new signing.
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Iam 46 year old with dodgy ankle im covering the minutes.
He played two full seasons with Preston without a single injury, tore an ankle ligament at Schalke that he was able to return from less than 6 months later and now has a minor thigh strain. Extremely harsh to call him injury prone.
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And if rumours/ Klopp comments are to be believed we are looking for at least one defender anyway.
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You know thats not what i was saying.
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The club has always been looking to move Nat Phillips on though, and if anything, if we can’t sell him this window either thats an extra CB that we don’t really want still around.
Matip most likely leaves next year. He’s 32 and has already dropped to being third choice behind Konate.
Sepp’s contract will be renewed I think. There’s no point in developing a CB and letting him leave for free. In fact, going by his latest injury news, it might be difficult to find a loan move for him? If so then we could see him staying at the club as well. That will be another CB we’ve not really expected to be at the club.
Phillips is not being used anyway so that doesn’t matter. Matip will leave next summer. And Berg will probably sign a new deal this summer before heading out on loan. If he’s even fit to secure a move this summer.
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And by the way, Phillips’ contract is up to 2025.
He will be 28 then. Twenty-eight.
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If there’s someone appropriate this summer or in January then there’s every chance we would sign a CB now or then, but with Virgil, Kontate, Gomez and Matip and Phillips all probably here for another year, I don’t see any priority unless the right player for the right price is available and we’ve done the other business we want to.
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Nat was loaned to Stuttgart right? How was he viewed? Could we include him in any German deals!
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But they were in the second tier back then and it wasn’t like he stood above all the defenders in the league.
Nat is an average player who is all about his physicality.
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Can still work with lower premier league sides. He is a much saner defender than slabby Maguire
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Nat is a defender for bottom premier league sides. Slabby is championship at best now. Any side taking slabhead now is gonna be fuckec
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I think nat will work well in a 3 CB formation where his lack of pace wont count against the team. He does the simple things right , which is more than you can say about slabby
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The time to sell Nat was shortly after he had done a stint in the side, performed well, and his star had risen. I can’t remember the details, but I have a recollection that we priced him out of a move. We aren’t talking huge sums, but we didn’t want to ‘give’ a player away for peanuts, so we stuck to our guns. At the time most people praised it, saying that we can’t let ourselves be pushed around in the transfer market to be taken advantage of, as holding our line will help to preserve value and bring more money in long term.
It’s a solid stance, but the other side of it is that sometimes you just have to take the money on offer, especially if you do not want the player. I have nothin but praise for Philipps - solid citizen, stout defender, committed… but his level is not good enough for us, and it was a special set of circumstances that allowed him to play in the team.
So fair play to him for what he did, but I can’t help but feel he has wasted a lot of his career at Liverpool by not playing, or being close to playing.
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I find it odd that Sepp van den Berg wasn’t offered an extension after he had a good season in 2022.
He was
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