3 Jul 2013

Transfer Fail: 'Fantastic' 169-goal star to sell for €10m (!) but LFC ignore him. Why...?

A few weeks ago, Anfield legend Steve Nicol urged Liverpool to sign Bayern Munich striker Mario Gomez as a potential replacement for Luis Suarez, but it appears the Reds may have lost the chance to grab one of Europe's most prolific goalscorers.

When asked recently who Liverpool should sign this summer to replace Suarez, Nicol told ESPN:

"If Suarez goes, get Mario Gomez in. You'll have a centre-forward who you know is going to be right in the middle, always in the penalty box, and just have the likes of Coutinho and Aspas deliver the ball".

Alas, according to Gomez's Agent, Uli Ferber, the striker is heading to Serie A. He told Sport1 this week:

“Gomez is going towards Fiorentina, but there are no contracts signed yet"

Fiorentina Chief Executive Sandro Menucci confirmed Fiorentina's interest this week. He told La Gazetta dello Sport:

"It's clear that Mario Gomez is one of the players that we are interested in. I can also say that he considers Fiorentina to be one of the clubs he would think about joining if he decides to change clubs."

The kicker? Gomez will reportedly only cost the Italians €10m (!)

With that in mind, why are Liverpool not trying to sign Gomez? Surely, for €10m, it's a no-brainer, especially for a striker with such an amazing goalscoring record:

Recent record (All Competitions: Club and International)

* 2008-09: 48 goals/assists in 62 apps.
* 2009-10: 24 goals/assists in 54 apps.
* 2010-11: 46 goals/assists in 55 apps.
* 2011-12: 53 goals/assists in 59 apps.
* 2012-13: 27 goals/assists in 39 apps

* TOTAL LAST 5 SEASONS: 169 goals/29 assists in 269 apps.
* Scores or creates a goal every 1.3 games

Gomez's goalscoring record is absolutely formidable. Even Luis Suarez would struggle to consistently deliver this kind of creative contribution. Very few strikers in world football have figures as good as this.

In January, former Liverpool Managing Director Christian Purslow confirmed that the Reds were 'hours away' from signing Gomez during the summer 2010 transfer window, and in a recent column for The Telegraph, Jamie Carragher revealed that Gomez was the club's first choice to replace Fernando Torres:

"Gómez and Carroll may have had contrasting fortunes in domestic football, but their similarities can be underlined by the fact that Liverpool almost signed Gomez before we moved for Carroll. It fell through at the last minute, and since then Gómez has not stopped scoring".

Former Bayern and Fiorentina forward Luca Toni can barely believe that his old club is about to snap up such a brilliant goalscorer, and he's convinced that the Viola are getting one of the world's best. He told Italy's Lady Radio:

"We are talking about a really fantastic player. I don't know whether they would be able to challenge for the title straight away with him, but they would be getting one of the best strikers in the world."

Gomez would be a great acquisition for Liverpool, for the following reasons:

* Goalscoring record speaks for itself: Gomez guarantees goals.
* Totally different in style to any of LFC's current attacking players.
* Would provide Liverpool with a legitimate and enticing 'Plan B'.
* Gomez's size/physique make him ideally suited to the Premier League.

Liverpool currently have no real variation in attack, and although other big strikers like Benteke and Lukaku are exciting options, neither have Gomez's experience and consistent goalscoring prowess.

Come on, Brendan: hijack Fiorentina's move and sign Gomez!





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37 comments:

  1. I know that you are a big fan of Gomez, and you know that I don't rate him that much, at least as a team player. Don't think that we missed out on something here. Bayern wanted € 20m, but only got 10. Says a lot about how wanted he was. And they paid nearly 30m for him.


    Furthermore, Steve Nicol is usually way off the mark with his opinion (imho). Considering that he wanted us to sign him, we might even have shirked a bullet here.

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  2. I never knew Steve Nicol was the liverpool manager gomez no thanks

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  3. Gomez is a good striker,but how can LFC sign him as a replacement for Suarez if we don't know the situation with him (Suarez) yet?....this article seems to acknowledge this point with the Nicol quote.So it seems somewhat contradictory to call it a LFC transfer fail. The inclusion of stats and quotes is sheer embellishment adding nothing to an already unsubstantiated article.

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  4. It amazes me that explayers eespecially great ones can have such bad judgement when it comes to tactics team set up and player integration. Especially one as experienced as Nicol. It really does baffle me. He knows what should be happening on the field better than Joe Bloggs but, he comes across like a complete novice. Maybe he likes a headline grabber or cant engage brain before speaking. Odd very odd. Anyway I think the team is set up a certain way now and he lacks the mobility to succeed perhaps in our system. Are Fiorentina in the CL? I think Italian league would suit him better. Remember that Spanish lad we signed from Madrid?

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  5. liverpool4life5658:36 pm, July 03, 2013

    Doesn't fit into our style, even pep think he doesn't either!:-)

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  6. Do you have a 10 year old who writes your headlines? You've got to do better than that if you want to be taken seriously.

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  7. Gomez scores loads, he may not fit our style but end of the day Strikers are mean`t to score. All this modern stuff about strikers should defend, or pass more etc is a extra to me, there main job is to score and I would rather have 25 goals from a striker who doesn`t bother passing much than 10 goals from a striker who does. For the price he is a bargin. Goals win games, and we don`t win enough, so adding players who score, can only ever be a good thing.

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  8. How about a player who "only" scores 25 because of his unawareness who could score 50 if he wouldn't drift out of games 90% of the time?

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  9. Morientes was a spent force when he joined us. Everybody knew it, but Rafa.

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  10. Can't argue with that logic!

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  11. fair point well made

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  12. too slow anyone can score with ribery,muller and robbhen with them
    and only this year bundesliga is a competitive leuge
    he does not fit rodgers style , no skills ,no pace and no link up
    classic carroll just a bit better

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  13. plus he is very old in fsg years
    and his wagesare likley to be high , most fans want suarez to stay
    if not mkhitaryan can fill in if need be , benteke is a gomez but with pace and skill , aspas is there and luis alberto is a top finisher
    so no fail

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  14. Very good finisher but not the kind of forward we need as the first XI striker. It is the same with Bayern, they rotated with him and Mandzukic. Lewandowski (when, I don't know!) will give them that mix of the two with his good finishing (not as predatory as Gomez but more clinical than Mandzukic) and overall team play. If Gomez was willing to be rotated and be on the bench, I'd consider it though.

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  15. Jamie can you please link s with more younger plyers unless it is a free we aint signing anyone old (over 25)
    we are likley to get ,ostly in the brackt of 20-25
    be very suprised if we spent 5m on any player over that age bracket
    mkhitaryan 24 , papadoplous 23, iloris 19, aspas 25,alberto 20,mingelot 25
    toure 32 like bellamy but he is also free

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  16. jovetic is awesome player

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  17. just think 9 million and shelvey for joe allen - mindboggling as shelvey is a better player.

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  18. He was coming off the back of an immense season in the Champions League for Monaco.

    I think it is hard to call him a spent force.

    He was just a bit too slow for the Prem. Despite being good in the air, he wasn't a big, robust lad either.
    I also think Rafa didn't give him enough of a chance (and he was unlucky with injuries).

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  19. Unrelated but Suarez backed in from 20/1 to 7/2 on Skybet to sign for Arsenal, must have been seen "house hunting" in London... ha someone's gonna lose a lot of money....

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  20. Suarez must not get enough paparazzi attention in Liverpool. Poor Luis.

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  21. It was odd seeing both Morientes and Crouch having games in the second striker position. Talk about unorthodox

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  22. "We need someone more mobile and complimentary for our style" You hit the nail on the head.LUIS MURIEL would be great option for us.REAL MADRID seems like the latest heavily rumoured destination for JOVETIC,if that's the case what does that mean for SUAREZ.Could it be he's wh3red himself out of a move to Spain?
    CHRISTIAN ERIKSEN i think is suffering from the same thing.Over flirting gets you cheap thrills but desperation is a turn off!

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  23. I just want this thing over and done with, in relation to us and Suarez but no one is pulling the striker trigger yet to really kick off the transfer merry go round over the likes of Cavani, Suarez, Higuain, Dzeko, Jovetic, Lewandowski, etc, with the likes of Real, City, etc, involved. Interesting for the neutral but annoying for us with Luis!


    I've put Eriksen on mute!

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  24. When BRENDAN ROGERS gets us playing the way he wants i think JOE ALLEN will turn into the player that the fans want/expect.You saw early season when we played heavily possession based football ALLEN was in his element and for the first month was our best player.
    The problem was the rest of the team was suffering because slow build up means the players you have need to be technically at a very high level.End product was another issue but as the season went on we modified our style slightly and the team got stronger but ALLEN's performances got worse.
    JONJO SHELVEY showed promise at times but also showed us erratic technique and dodgy tackles.We got a decent amount of money and SWANSEA is a good place for him!

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  25. Gomez is too good to be a "Plan B" - Sturridge has been better than I expected as a striker, but I rated him as one of the top wide forwards around before he joined us.


    Sturridge flanking Gomez from the right, with Suarez cutting in from the opposite flank and Coutinho in the hole would be a world class attacking quartet!

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  26. tbh I think LFC *SHOULD* be focusing on players in the 22-25 age range - that's where all the value is!


    Younger than that and you're likely to be over-paying for unproven "potential".
    Older than that, and you're likely to be over-paying for players that have already peaked/hit their maximum transfer value.

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  27. In order for Rodgers' tactical plan to work, all 3 of the forwards (or lone striker/false 9) need to be extremely mobile. If that player is to be a predator type a la Owen or even Fowler, he needs to be quick in order to compensate as well as being a supreme finisher.
    Gomez is a great finisher, but isn't mobile enough and has no speed to compensate, so he simply won't fit in with the team. The days of the slow single minded predator who can finish, Mickey Quinn anybody? are fast disappearing in the modern game.
    So, great finisher, but no thanks. Would have fitted in Kenny's team perfectly though.

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  28. Gomez is a stud. Regardless weather or not LS goes - Liverpool need to add a striker, preferably one who is also good with his head. Gomez, Kiessling would be good - Sturridge is good, but not enough, and is injury prone.

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  29. It staggers me that Gomez is seemingly not rated by Bayern. His scoring record is outstanding. I guess the main question is how he might fit into our style of play. All our talk of a "plan B" might have an element of common sense to it but it's not perhaps how Rodgers gets a team to be effective. Over the past year it's rarely been the case that Liverpool have been unable to affect their tactics because a team has forced them out of it. When we've been poor it's been simply because we've been poor i.e. it's because we're not been able to even get "plan A" right. It doesn't make sense to me that if you're unable to get your normal style of football right for no other reason except you're just being rubbish that suddenly changing to a different style would make any difference. Going to plan B when you can't even do plan A won't help because the problem is not the plan, it's the players and their failure to make passes, press with enough speed, or hold their structure. Those same problems will be there no matter what plan you try. From what I've seen of Rodgers and the way he tries to change a game that's not going to plan it's more a case that he inserts a player with a different attitude or a different level of energy. He makes small adjustments, maybe shifts a couple of players around, but the formation and the general approach to the game remains very similar. He pretty much sticks with plan A the whole time and I personally think that makes sense. Until Liverpool get to a point where we can effectively perform plan A at a consistently high level there is no need to talk about plan B.

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  30. Fiorentina aren't in the CL next season, so no way Gomez leaves the treble winners to go there! That's how the logic goes, right?


    Oh yea, it must be the mega-money on offer at a club like Fiorentina, that would attract a proven winner like him... right?

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  31. Won't happen. He's not 12, has played more than 5 matches for a club's first team, does not have a youtube blooper reel and he plays for an actual football team and not relegation fodder. He obviously does not fit the BR criteria.

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  32. That's odd, I thought he'd already signed at Napoli. That was the news at the beginning of June anyway. Maybe Benitez vetoed it when he arrived? I think Gomez is a sensational player but again not a player like Suarez but more to compete with Sturridge. Although not as fast as Sturridge, he would need to play closer to goal to be really effective.Not sure if he would work out at Anfield. That said, I'm not sure anymore what BR's plans are for next season after yesterday really.

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  33. thing is guardiola is a fan of fast pacy forwards like suarez and mandkuzic ........

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  34. Just read on a rather reliable German website (that's not Bild then), that his deal with Fiorentina is far from finished, as Bayern want € 20m, but the Italians are only willing to pay 10, but there are actually negotiations.


    I don't think that it would work out for him in the Prem to be honest. Opinions are pretty split in Germany, too. Some claim it doesn't matter how he scores, all that counts is that he does it, and others, like me, claim that he is a player with little awareness, vision, football intelligence and so on.

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  35. I don't think you can score as many goals as he does without vision. The way he played against Holland in Euro2012 he was impressive. You didn't notice he was on the pitch and the first chance he got he tucked away. A bit like Romario used to do. I don't think he's for us though. We play a game where the striker needs to be dynamic. He can't snipe because he is Always visible. It's all about the right movement and the right pass to put him through. I can't see Gomez doing that.

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  36. Well i suppose after paying Mandy C 35 mill, Yeah it's a bargain as he is the established AC.. In my opinion he looks awkard and clumsey. Don't think he wud suite our game!!! Plan b cud b good as he is proven quaility!!

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  37. Don't know who claimed that he has no vision.

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