IN an interview with German newspaper Die Welt at the weekend, Jürgen Klopp was asked about Manchester City, Manchester United and Chelsea investing heavily in new players. José Mourinho, Pep Guardiola and Antonio Conte “are not known to go shopping at Aldi,” he replied.
And so, here we are again, not even in August and we have the all-too-familiar story of a Liverpool FC manager letting it be known, albeit in assenting terms, that the club won’t be shopping at the Formby end of the supermarket spectrum this summer.
Convivial Klopp’s manner may be, but he certainly has a way of getting his message across and in a week when it was revealed that Liverpool Football Club, even in the post-Brexit Sterling slump, is now worth more than an eye-watering £1billion, any expectations of Liverpool competing financially with their supposed peers have been dashed emphatically.
Expectations well and truly managed.
While Klopp’s standing as one of the top managers in Europe is beyond doubt, and his philosophy and ability around the coaching of improving players is in keeping with what the core tenets of Liverpool should be about, it cannot and should not be used as a blanket to cover up the fact that sometimes, even with the best coaching in the world, sometimes you need a little extra.
The impression projected by the club, with the manager’s consent, is that he believes that by looking for very specific attributes in his targets he can identify the so-called ugly ducking and make them into an effective cog in a highly-tuned, aggressive, attacking unit.
It’s all a bit Moneyball, isn’t it?
As well as being probably the best manager in the league, Klopp is undoubtedly the best fit of any manager in world football for Liverpool Football Club. But he is no miracle worker.
While Klopp might also be publicly happy to extol the virtues of coaching and financial conservatism in football — values that just to happen to conveniently align with those of his paymasters — it would be foolish to think that he would turn down the opportunity to add some genuine stardust if the opportunity were afforded to sprinkle it.
And in another example of why you should never take notice of what a manager might say publicly, compare and contrast the mixed messages below:
“So if I would speak to a player now and he would tell me ‘if you were playing in the Champions League next year, I would be really interested’ then I would put the phone down from my side.” – Jürgen Klopp, April 2016.
“We can talk about the one or two disadvantages that we have. We are not in the Champions League, we are not in the Europa League. That possibly means a player wants to play in the Champions League or European football or whatever so cannot join Liverpool.” – Jürgen Klopp, July 2016.
This isn’t a dig at the manager, far from it, but a lesson in reality and a game that every manager in football has to play.
The truth is that using a lack of European football as an absolute barrier to signing the players you want, as Manchester United have proven over the last two seasons and Manchester City before them, is a cop out if you are genuinely ambitious enough.
And while shopping at Aldi might put you in the top four or five restaurants in town, sometimes you can’t do a Delia and substitute Maris Pipers for powdered Smash.
To stretch the theme a little further, sometimes if you want to make something extra special you need those rare ingredients that they just don’t stock in your local Aldi, or even the more exotic Co-op up the road in Crosby.
Sometimes, if you want it to be perfect, you need to take your base ingredients and take that trip up the bypass to Waitrose to get your sumac and pomegranate molasses that, as a certain spicy Uruguayan has proven in the past, can make all the difference.
In the era of billion-pound valuations, record TV money, selling bits of wood for £200 and a summer when Liverpool — assuming Christian Benteke to Crystal Palace goes through — are likely to show a transfer profit and a wage bill £350,000-a-week lighter, shouldn’t the newly emboldened Klopp be allowed to celebrate his six-year contract by going out and showing out? Or have Liverpool had a glance at what Leicester have achieved and thought that trying to replicate a likely once-in-a-lifetime occurrence should be the way forward?
The obvious counter argument is that money isn’t everything and to point to Klopp’s Dortmund team and how they signed Lewandowski, Hummels and Gundogan all for less than Liverpool paid for Joe Allen. But the reality is that at the same time, Dortmund were, and still are, comfortably the second biggest spenders in the Bundesliga behind Bayern Munich.
Couple that with the simple reality that as much as English football has many lessons to learn from the Bundesliga, competitiveness isn’t one of them.
For Dortmund to win the Bundesliga they have one financially superior giant to overcome, Liverpool have at least four. That is a reality that the manager of Liverpool Football Club has to work with every single day.
Klopp may have the first and last say on his purchases, but when the shop he’s sanctioned to spend the money isn’t even in the area code as his supposed equals, he may struggle for a mixed metaphor title-winning checkout.
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Always comes down to FFP, doesn’t it? The lack of that European revenue hugely harmful to us compared to the richer clubs.
Couldn’t agree more. With the TV money and the outgoing players, LFC should have enough in the kitty to at least attempt to sign our preferred targets.
Chelsea have no European football and Man U only have Europa (which you would not expect to be enough to bring in the likes of Zlatan), but you can both will go hard after some of the biggest targets out there.
Also, what does it say to the players we’ve brought in this summer and the ones we are still targeting if we are calling them Aldi quality!? Ha
With the TV money and the outgoing players, LFC should have enough in the kitty to at least attempt to sign our preferred targets.
Who says they aren’t? Was Mane in the veg bin at Aldi? Klopp is looking for specific players to fit specific needs. Looking for reasons to throw rotten tomatoes at FSG is great fun but this article is built on sand.
I expect Andy is just bored or had to put something on, but this kind of banal, trite writing with no foundation is pretty poor.
No foundation? The manager himself admitted he can’t compete financially with United, City or Chelsea.
And Mane was signed because we couldn’t convince Gotze who was holding out for a better offer, which kind of proves my point.
But on what basis are you so sure that Goetze would be better for us than Mane? Goetze looked jaded, unfit and unfocused at the Euros. Between the two I’d rather have Mane. I remain unconvinced that at the mid range – say £20m to £40 – there’s a proven correlation between increased price and increased positive impact. Compare and contrast Carroll, Keane, Suarez, Torres, Benteke and Alonso. I simply don’t see the proof that paying more gets better outcomes i.e. winning more matches. Bale, Messi and Suarez wouldn’t come even if we had more money. We’re the 9th richest club in Europe. When the transfer window closes I bet we have arguably the 9th best squad. And I’d still be confident that we’ll take on Chelsea, Man City, Arsenal (and yes, Leicester!), and win the league. Not because of our bank balance or credit line but because of our manager. Let’s wait and see.
Goetze, imo, proves not much other than Goetze opinion of himself is almost as large as his waistline. The lad is plain fat.if Klopp wanted Goetze, he’d likely be here already especially at less than the 30m Mane cost.
Tamping expectations (not THAT aisle) is managerial doublespeak for overwrought fans, like me. And, perhaps you? Believe everything he says? Hmmm, journo?
I think it is a stretch to try and contrast the two statements by Klopp on recruiting players who want CL football, They don’t look inconsistent to me. He is saying that LFC can’t recruit some players because of lack of CL, but that if that is an issue with a player he isn’t interested in talking to them.
Also any comparisons with United’s situation is plane daft. Whatever the historical comparison fans might draw, United are a much bigger team and a much bigger draw. In terms of overall value and revenue they dwarf us, and none of us needs reminding of relative levels of success of the teams in the lifetime of most of our recruitment targets.
Agreed, GreameR. I found the article wholly flawed on those two points, too. I read those two statements until I went cross-eyed and didn’t see the inconsistency in them.
The amount of negativity around (not overtly in this article, to be clear) is staggering. “In Klopp we trust” say so many and then prove otherwise in the next breath. And the argument that Klopp is merely kowtowing to the owners is without validation.
If we fail miserably this season (to qualify for Champions League and to give the title a good go), then we’ll all be asking questions and rightly so. But wow, let Klopp have a go first.
I’ve supported Liverpool for thirty years. I remember the glory days. Many players today weren’t even born yet. We don’t have the cash flow of United, City, Chelsea or Arsenal. We’re not in the Champions League. We haven’t won the title for too many long years. In a day in which players are more worried about current success and money (and let’s be real, who blames them), it’s not the upper echelon of elite players that we’re able to attract. I don’t like it, but it’s the way it is.
If we could have built on 13/14, we would have taken significant strides to turn the narrative. In Klopp, we could have another year like that, but he’s more likely to build on it.
Okay,me nought waffling from me, but please let’s trust the man.
Utd and Chelsea are only recently without CL football. If they have been going on 6/7 yrs without it you might find things are different.
Bar 14/15 we’ve been without CL football for several yrs now and we didn’t exactly do well in it that one year. In fact we havnt really been close to getting CL football regularly finishing 6/7/8th. Perhaps players from around Europe and beyond see this and think we’re not getting it anytime soon either.
We automatically think of the likes of City, Utd and Chelsea as teams we need to overcome but in recent years now Spurs regularly finish above us. They’ve had more CL and European football than us in the last 7yrs.
Think about that a sec…in the last 7 seasons we’ve failed to secure CL football on 6 occasions and no European football whatsoever on 2 occasions.
That’s where we are right now.
If people don’t think that’s a barrier to securing the signatures of better quality players then they’re deluded.
Exactly. its easy to use X, Y, Z reasons to put a Neg spin on things..another typical human problem.
If FSG were in charge of Everton you’d say they’re not very ambitious in the market, let alone Liverpool. Buying the best of Southampton or relegated Newcastle shows what their ambition is.
The value of the club keeps rising (which is FSG’s chief concern) while the team stays mired in mediocrity because of the mediocre ambition in transfer market.
I have to agree with Koolhand21 about the sand — the author himself uses 2 examples “of why you should never take notice of what a manager might say publicly.” So the overall point is Jürgen cracked a little joke to a German reporter and it’s really not worth paying any attention to it. Perhaps the real reason this was written was to have a chance to toss out another dig about those wooden seats…
It’s lazy thinking to blame FSG every time something happens at the Club that doesn’t live up to the moaning demands of a fanbase that more often than not lives in fantasyland. The Empire is not coming back, and in the modern-day Premier League it’s unlikely that any club will have a dynasty again any time soon. Jürgen Klopp is a pragmatist; if he can win the League once in his tenure he will probably think he succeeded, and so will FSG.
Aldi has been supermnarket of the year 2 years running – so not the worst place to shop at all
Totally agree Ellie,
I reckon the premier league may become similar to the European cup where it’s almost impossible to retain,
Fans moaning about where we purchase from do my head in,
I doubt the Chelsea fans are cribbing because they bought from Leicester and Marseille,
Personally I’d love a deadline day from Scunny.
Spot on, both Ellie& Derek.
Cheers
I bought the recent 4 man tent they sold. And to be fair, although the Mrs is not the camping type, even she appreciated the quality at a reasonable price. Yes, better equipment could have been purchased to satisfy the Bear Grylls types, but if you want something to look back on and feel proud about what you’ve created then it’s Ray Mears for me every time….or er Aldi…or Klopp.
Truth is no matter what TV brings in the league is inflating with it so we are getting the same money as Utd, Chelsea & City from TV and they still have a huge financial advantage over us; so unless we are getting bought out by Petrodollars we have gained no other financial advantage over those above us so whining about it really does nothing now does it?
Some of the clubs who are financially above us can simply spend £50 million on a player and if he flops then so be it..its just money and we will get another, we cannot do that so it would be pretty damn hard to blame FSG because they are worth £18 billion less than Mansour and £7 billion less than Abromovich.
What this article is really bemoaning is the fact that no sheikh or oligarch has come in to purchase us and buy the title..that’s what this is. As a supporter base we are some of the most intelligent out there; however we are also some of the biggest whiner’s our there.
If you can’t beat City or Chelsea in a straight up financial fight (which we cannot nor can 99% of other teams in the world) then you best go at them in a different way which is exactly what were doing because.
Unless the Sultan of Brunei comes in as an owner we are not going to spend like City or PSG…even if he did come in an purchase the club there would be some that moaned over him not being Scouse.
I wonder why Jurgen signed a 6 year deal if he was so upset with the LFC transfer policies?
The answer to that (probably) is that he isn’t upset at all.
Potentially the deals we have done so far are good and let’s not forget that the window is still open for a month and a half.
I think the Aldi quip was tongue in cheek and should be disregarded.
Oh, and would Keegan and Clemence have been classed as “Aldi” or “Lidl”?
All this said before the window is closed.
The Elephant in the room here is that L4 is not top of the lifestyle destinations deemed so important by players and wags alike. Yes money talks, but we are a mid table side with a great manager, and a great, now very distant history, that means little to the new generation of players.
Lets wait see what happens this window. lets wait see what happens this season. Lets just see what happens when we get into the CL again (because surely the list of incomings would have been different had we beaten Seville). The Manchester arguments are shot down by recent history amongst other things.
IMO the money will be there, for the right player, at the right time.
Since when have players or managers lived in L4?…You think fucking Stretford is a lifestyle choice?
Fucking winds me up when people reel that shit out.
@mushroom Ask Sanchez.
It’s one of many factors that work against Liverpool, a smaller one admittedly in the large scheme of things, but another factor nevertheless.
5th and a cup is a reasonable expectation, along with some strong performances from Firmimio and Coutinho. A full season from Sturridge.
Some good pressers from Klopp…
That’s it.
You cant sell things on at a profit if you shop at Aldi…..the only reason we buy young players is to sell them on at huge profit like Suarez and Stirling.
Fsg are happy to take money off its fans and wanted to charge even more until the backlash . They only froze it because of the bad press which in turn could damage future sponsors. Fsg lack ambition on the footballing side. Finishing 1st or 15th makes little financial difference. In many ways I think they’d hate the idea of us getting into the champions league regularly as that would mean bigger wages and better players needed to compete at the top . what ever we earn in the champions league would be dwarfed by team building and restructuring the wages.fsg are only interested in getting lfc to peak financial using as little money as possible. Once peaked they’d sell.
we don’t need the title yet. We just need enough to start building for the title. And as Damien Hughes says, it’s not always about having the best players, it’s about having the players in the best environment.
Man Utd, Man City and Chelsea have bought shiny new Ferraris so we need to have one…who is that crazy looking German guy putting bananas in their tailpipes!
Although I don’t expect Klopp to turn water into wine with the signings we’ve made and 2 or 3 more to come in he’ll get us competing, have a little faith after all this is the guy who got us to 2 cup finals with a squad which would have got no where near that if BR had stayed as manager.
Come on gents the glass is half full, enjoy the ride that’s coming up!
I think the truth is somewhere in the middle on this one.
Man Utd and Chelsea are a different prospect to us for players. Utd have won 8 league titles in the past 16 seasons. Now they have Mourinho who can also lure players. Chelsea have won 4 league titles in the past decade and 5 FA Cups and like Utd the CL in that time.
We’ve had 1 good day in a quarter of a century. It’s not realistic to think young players across Europe see us the same as the 2 aforementioned.
That said we’re still one of the top 10 teams across Europe. FSG seem to have allowed us to spend what we can afford without taking on debt. Previously that seems to have been around £35m net per season.
But the last financial results before this year showed a £1m profit. I think that justifies previous spending. This years figures (a year behind) showed over £50m profit and was put down to the Suarez money not being spent. In some ways I can understand how that happened once we failed to get Sanchez. I’m not convinced there was an expensive striker available to us. I expected at least 75% of that profit to go towards this windows kitty. I thought with the extra tv money another £30m could be freed up plus the obligatory £35m. In truth, I thought we could spend £100m and still have a few quid in the bank once the figures for this period are eventually released.
Based on who we’ve bought and who is likely to go out plus the probable 2 to come in we could end up spending less than the £35m net of previous years when we were on our arse a bit. Klopp is clearly different in his approach but there seem to have been players he wanted and who wanted us that we won’t land because we haven’t bid enough. Ok, don’t throw money away but with how our net spend may end this window, to not get a target for the sake of £5m makes me question what we’re doing. All seems a bit same old same old.
Worse, there are certainly more than 2 places in our first 11 that need strengthening. Why haven’t we offered enough to get Hector? Even if we pay £5m more than he’s worth it’s worth it. FSG have to be careful. They don’t like upsetting the fans imo but the way the others have bought we still need more quality.
To conclude. I don’t think it’s as easy as shipping in a more expensive shop where if you have the coin you simply give em the jargon and get the bargain but I do think we could have done much better. We absolutely have to break into the top 4 this season as a minimum. It’s gonna be tough but if we end up coming 7th again with the net spend I’ve outlined above then the finger won’t be pointed at our rivals and how strong they are. It won’t be pointed at Klopp and his preference to develop players. No, it will be pointed at FSG because the bottom line is we can’t attract the cream but if you pay the wages better players than we’re targeting will come. The perception so far, whether right or wrong is hard to know, but it’s certainly one of being too conservative again at a time when the PL and LFC is awash with money. We need 2 more quality players. If we don’t get them then only top 4 can appease. Any lower and this unity we want will be fragile to say the least. The bottom line which counters all arguments is we need to show intent.
Robin, how exactly do you know FOR A FACT that “there seem to have been players he wanted and who wanted us that we won’t land because we haven’t bid enough”? Nobody’s privy to the details of transfer negotiations except the people directly involved in the negotiations. There’s no telling what was said to a player, what was said between the player and his agent, or what transpired between the agent and the Club’s negotiator. There’s a huge chasm between fact and speculation. And what’s said in the press more often than not cannot be taken as fact.
In fairness Ellie, I don’t think ‘but there seem(s) to have been players he wanted and who wanted us that we won’t land because we haven’t bid enough’ can be translated as ‘I know FOR A FACT’ in anyones book.
Appreciate my point doesn’t tie in with your perfect world of LFC but I think you’ve gone over the top on this one. I marched in London against the Iraq war in 2003 yet I wasn’t privy to what went on in Downing St. I do think that one skill I do have is an ability to process information and with intuition decide on what’s right and wrong. In that case I was right without having inside knowledge. Point being this, not everything you hear or read is wild speculation without any basis. Sometimes you can decipher the signals. So,
Do you think Zielinski was a Liverpool target?
Do you think Zielinski wanted to join Liverpool?
Did his club put a valuation on him that we could get him for?
Did he sign?
If you don’t answer yes, yes, yes, no then you’re a fool. Sorry, but that’s how it is whether the answers suit you or not.
P.s What is the point of us discussing / writing or even thinking anything if nothing has any merit unless it’s come from the inner core of the club? And, for the record, you seem to have equally strong views on the other side of the fence that also haven’t come from the club directly.
It’s early days in the window yet but I think concerns about our ambition have some merit at this point.
This is what I don’t get about the Zielinski saga.
We had pissed Udinese off with our public courting off him so they stood firm on their valuation of £13/14mil.
Klopp wanted him clearly, he wanted to join, he was our first possibly 2nd choice (Mahmoud?) target but we refused to pay that money.
So now we are turning to our 2nd (3rd) choice target and are willing to pay, by all accounts, £10mil more?
How does that make sense?
If Klopp really wants him, thinks he’ll really help us and the lad wants to join then just pay the money? He preferred him over Wiljnaldum clearly so just pay the £2/3mil xtra and save ourselves £10mil in the long run.
Zielinski has a greater ceiling, both footballing and financially wise too.
Be careful making assumptions like that mate. Ellie will be on your case unless you’ve heard what you’ve put from a club official.
They have switched targets because Udinese were acting the dicks,
They accepted an offer from Napoli which we then matched but Udinese said no to our offer and seemingly wanted more dosh ??
Klopp was correct to knock it on the head.
Life doesn’t always work like that mate. There’s a cafe next to the library in my town. For every coffee I buy they give one free to a homeless person. I like the coffee in there. I’m not going to stop buying their coffee because it’s not fair that I have to spend my life working and they don’t. I just accept that I’m deemed to be better off even though I’m not. Go abroad and you get a tourist price and a locals price. You don’t have to pay it but if you don’t you don’t get. Simple. Premier league teams will face the same problem. Some will pay the extra, some won’t and some will do better than other teams in the league. I just want us to stop this trying to be smart. It’s ok when it works but for the sake of 2 or 3m we’re potentially suffering. Let’s just show some ambition or some intent. Like Michael above points out – if our second choice is a few mill more and possibly not as good, can we really feel like smug bastards because you don’t get one over on us or are we complete dicks who’re up our own arse. I’m not sure. All I know is we keep coming 7th.
I can live without a high price signing given what has happened to several of our recent ones. But the worst player in our starting XI by some way at the moment is Moreno. I don’t know whether the young Leicester lad is the right choice or not but if it is correct that we are missing out on someone we seem to really want for 2-3 million, I can’t understand that at all.
Michael and Robin are right about the CL issue – a player thinking about CL for the next 5 years will choose Man U or Chelsea over Leicester and probably Spurs.
2 things on Chilwell – he is NOT 1st team ready, nowhere near ready in his development.
Second, he is out of contract next summer so we could get him for free and have him sign on jan 01st if we can.
This particular rumour is not one to be sweating over.
FSG cheap skate behaviour has been made public by agents and club presidents every window, witnessed recently in our dealings with Loreint and Raphael Guerreiro.
Accept FSG have run this club down into the mid table.
They have owned us long enough to make it obvious what their business model is, and we have all seen enough pedaling of hope and too little top footy to seriously believe we are in with a reliable chance of top 4.
Fuck FSG.
Up the reds! 5th or 6th as per.
First I’ve seen such FSG Derangement Syndrome. I hope whatever team you root for can someday meet your expectations. Too bad there isn’t one in the EPL. Maybe you should go amateur? You’ve got the writing and logic skills for it.
What are you on about? No one serious has even linked us to Guerreiro.
Ridiculous – the man says he wants only players that want to come to Liverpool to push the boat and not ride the wave. He says players who want to come to us only because of CL are not welcome – later he says that many players wont want to come to us because of lack of CL anyway, nothing inconsistent
Yet, because you have an agenda to show that the club (the money men always) arent giving him what he wants he is trying to make the best of a bad deal – rubbish – he got £30m for a Southampton player but apparently we are missing out on others because the owners wont stump up more
He says all of this repeatedly but what we get here is you saying to us that he doesn’t really mean that and he’s covering for his bosses – you throw away his record of making stars from the small amounts he’s paid with a simple ‘Dortmind are the 2nd highest spenders in Germany’ – so what – Paisley always developed players over buying stars but still bought a star or two occasionally.
Your laboured point that he may need to shop in other supermarkets is nonsensical, if he’s got £30m without the funds he wouldn’t spend last Jan, without the money that will be generated from sales, and without the TV money we have this year and there were players he wanted to buy dont you think we would have prioritised the relatively lower cost players from abroad than players such as Mane?
There’s money available and if he isn’t spending it on ‘names’ or spending it in upmarket stores it’sbecause he doesn’t want to, not because the club dont want him to – but that doesn’t fit with your theme so you make up analogies about cooking to cover your lack of facts about the club not supporting him
Your agenda shines through and it is surprisingly prevalent on LFC fan’s websites that the manager is a hero trying his best with the handicap that the owners place on him
This is all because it’s not about football for most of you type of fans, it is tribal – you want a summer of being able to gloat about this name or that name – non of Klopp’s stars were stars when he bought them, he’s always shopped at Lidl and he’s always made nice cakes
Obviously the owners have transfer policies and salary caps in place. Did you support this club when John Henry wrote his open letter? Or when Rodgers spat his dummy out over Ballotelli?
FSG have been here for 6 six years.
And won a minor cup.
They are shit.
It’s called economics
You cant spend more than you make – look at the improvements in what we make – FSG have improved the club
However that is not the point. The point is that Klopp has himself said he is happy with what he has and wants to buy players that come for the challenge and not for the money. His past record bears this out
But you dont accept that, You think he’s just saying that and FSG are denying him funds – a player like Mane would be cheaper from the continent so why buy him. The prices we pay for ill fitting players such as Carroll and Benteke – is that also FSG’s fault?
In each close season it’s all I hear, supposed fans who just want us to buy the biggest names to gloat for a couple of weeks before the season starts. Seems more important for some than the season itself. It doesn’t matter who we buy and how good they are it’s just about that instant fix from the excitement in the papers for you
I, for one, am very happy and enjoying the progress we are slowly making and watching Klopp make football fun again – I dont really know why you bother as you dont seem to take much interest in the football
So the premise for this article is a throwaway line at the weekend? Really? When everything Klopp has said and done thus far in his career goes against the concept of throwing money at it?
As someone else has said, would he have signed up for another 6 years of this if he wasn’t happy with the plan? I prefer to think that he buys players based on what he thinks they bring to his vision of how he wants to play. If they cost 30 million so be it. But if he can get them on a Bosman then so much the better.
PS. Get over the Formby thing Andy. Seaforth isn’t that bad!
The problem is that City, Utd and Chelsea can justifiably say or have said “look, we missed out on Champs League last season but that’s a rare exception. We’re investing heavily, join us and we’ll back in it next year”. The elite players look at that and think “yeah, I can live with that for one season”
Liverpool have to say “look, we’ve missed out on the Champs League and I know we’ve not qualified regularly for years. We’re investing in the squad and we hope to be back there this season or next”. The elite players look at that and think “hmmm, the track record suggests otherwise. I don’t want to go there and have 2 or 3 seasons not playing at the top level”
And that’s even before you add in the eyewatering revenue streams Utd pull in that means they can drop £100m on Pogba without worry.
Could Liverpool afford much higher wages? Probably. Could Liverpool afford to match the spending power of City, Utd and Chelsea? Debatable. Is that model sustainable for a club like LFC? I’d argue it’s not.
there are three near certainties when discussing Liverpools transfer business…
Everyone has a encyclopaedic depth of knowledge on every player and that knowledge will be used to prove the following –
A…every player a rival signs wil be, almost without exception, better than anything we have or have bought.
B – every player we are linked with and dont sign will be, almost without exception, better than anything we do buy.
C – any player we miss out on was due to FSG being tight and any players we buy is FSG overpaying – there are no exceptions here.
Well said KM1806
In his first half season Klopp was within touching distance to top 4 and winning two cups.
Moreno would probably not start for any other team. Rodgers was right to start anyone else ahead of him.
Mignolet was a liability.
The injury situation was simply terrible where we had all our strikers or all our central defenders out.
I have a lot of faith in Klopp.
Gone are the days where we scouted the lower leagues and Scotland and brought players from Tranmere, Chester, Scunthorpe and all that. I want that back. Has the club got lazy and decided it is easier to buy players off Southampton rather than buy them before Southampton got them?
Really rooting for Ings this year as his injury last time around cost us a lot.
Remember also the ban on Sakho could not have been timed worse.