Liverpool have lost on some major signings over the last year, with FC Dnipro attacker Yehven Konoplyanka the latest in a long line of high profile transfer fails. Earlier this month, Anfield legend John Aldridge revealed his frustration with that particular failed deal, but his former team-mate, Jan Mollby, insists that Liverpool have actually benefited from missing out on the likes of Konoplyanka and Willian.
In his column for Eurosport this this week, Molby argued that FSG probably felt that Rodgers 'could make the team better without having to bring in a lot of new faces, adding:
"Sterling and Henderson...are playing as well as they ever have. Upon reflection, there has been good fortune in not landing Willian and Konoplyanka [combined value: £47m]. The balance is absolutely right".
After failing to land Konoplyanka, Rodgers argued that the lack of January signings would 'galvanise' the team, and that is exactly what appears to be happening.
It would be interesting to see where LFC would be right now if the club had signed Willian last summer, or Konoplyanka in January. As with any transfer, there's no guarantee that either of those two players would've improved the squad, but it's hard to imagine they would've *hindered* the Reds' title charge.
I doubt Henderson's place would've been under threat, but it's possible that Sterling may have started less games, and the same applies to Coutinho. Then again, having a stiff competition might've pushed both players to greater heights, which - in Coutinho's case - would've been a good thing.
Reds hero Mark Lawrenson believes that it's Konoplyanka who would've struggled to get into the team, not Sterling. In a recent column for The Mirror he observed:
"Even if Brendan had brought in winger Yevhen Konoplyanka from Dnipro, I don’t think he would have got into the side ahead of [Raheem] Sterling, who has improved beyond recognition"
Spurs are allegedly convinced that Konoplyanka will join them over the Reds this summer, but if Liverpool do go back in for the attacker, one crucial factor could make the difference: Champions League football.
LFC will almost certainly finish in the top four this season, so why would Konoplyanka reject the chance to play in Europe's elite competition? Does he have kind of personal allegiance to Spurs? I seriously doubt it. Indeed, when asked if he was upset about the failed LFC deal, Konoplyanka told reporters:
"Well, I will not hide it, there is a little resentment, but life goes on. I hope that everything will turn out okay."
Konoplyanka's comments seem to suggest that he wanted the move, and hopes for the deal to be resurrected in the summer. A lot of things can, and probably will, change over the next few months, though, and with the World Cup to come, new transfer targets will inevitably emerge for LFC.
New players are definitely needed to help Liverpool make the step-up to the Champions League, but improving the club's attack is (arguably) the least of LFC's transfer priorities.
Author: Jaimie K
In his column for Eurosport this this week, Molby argued that FSG probably felt that Rodgers 'could make the team better without having to bring in a lot of new faces, adding:
"Sterling and Henderson...are playing as well as they ever have. Upon reflection, there has been good fortune in not landing Willian and Konoplyanka [combined value: £47m]. The balance is absolutely right".
After failing to land Konoplyanka, Rodgers argued that the lack of January signings would 'galvanise' the team, and that is exactly what appears to be happening.
It would be interesting to see where LFC would be right now if the club had signed Willian last summer, or Konoplyanka in January. As with any transfer, there's no guarantee that either of those two players would've improved the squad, but it's hard to imagine they would've *hindered* the Reds' title charge.
I doubt Henderson's place would've been under threat, but it's possible that Sterling may have started less games, and the same applies to Coutinho. Then again, having a stiff competition might've pushed both players to greater heights, which - in Coutinho's case - would've been a good thing.
Reds hero Mark Lawrenson believes that it's Konoplyanka who would've struggled to get into the team, not Sterling. In a recent column for The Mirror he observed:
"Even if Brendan had brought in winger Yevhen Konoplyanka from Dnipro, I don’t think he would have got into the side ahead of [Raheem] Sterling, who has improved beyond recognition"
Spurs are allegedly convinced that Konoplyanka will join them over the Reds this summer, but if Liverpool do go back in for the attacker, one crucial factor could make the difference: Champions League football.
LFC will almost certainly finish in the top four this season, so why would Konoplyanka reject the chance to play in Europe's elite competition? Does he have kind of personal allegiance to Spurs? I seriously doubt it. Indeed, when asked if he was upset about the failed LFC deal, Konoplyanka told reporters:
"Well, I will not hide it, there is a little resentment, but life goes on. I hope that everything will turn out okay."
Konoplyanka's comments seem to suggest that he wanted the move, and hopes for the deal to be resurrected in the summer. A lot of things can, and probably will, change over the next few months, though, and with the World Cup to come, new transfer targets will inevitably emerge for LFC.
New players are definitely needed to help Liverpool make the step-up to the Champions League, but improving the club's attack is (arguably) the least of LFC's transfer priorities.
Author: Jaimie K
Willian Carvalho is going to MUFC for £37m. I am really annoyed because he will be a world beater in a few years. We should have tried to get him.
ReplyDeletehe is average
ReplyDeletein cam : draxler ,koke or firmino would be better options
draxler would be a major signing in my opinion
we also need a class left back would love luke shaw
rodgers should get draxler 35m, shaw 30m , shaqiri 14m
and sell borini ,aspas,suso,alberto,assaidi,iloris,reina,
For £37m mate no way let scum have him, world class players out there for that sort of money. Plus we've a team of world beaters at the moment, roll on the big red machine. We're destorying any team that gets in are way at minute.
ReplyDeletenonsense. Sporting Lisbon have this idea in their head because they created an absolute monster in C.Ronaldo, hands down the the best football player ever, that all players from their academy will be the next big thing. CR7 did become a great, but that was very much down to his own desire and determination to reach the top. ever since that though, they overcharge for all of the Academy starlets doing well in their first team. Sporting robbed us for the Ilori money as well. he's first firgures were £4M, they managed to double the fee!
ReplyDeleteanyways LFC need players who wont mess up the balance. £40M should be enough for a double deal for Adam Lallana and Luke Shaw. would love those players in the squad and should fit in seemlessly with the other english players and the world class Luis Suarez. after that i want us to sign Christian Benteke. i literally love him, and i think having him in your starting line up autuomatically puts fear into the opposition. hes goals have not flowed like they did last season but he still very much the same menace. £20M should be enough for Benteke as well and i also like Michu in midfield as well for extra Midfield options.
with Lallana, Michu, Benteke and Shaw onto our current squad with the removal of Aspas, Moses and Cissokho. our squad will be ready to compete Strongly on four fronts. all proven star PL players.
no way he would offer lfc nothing we need
ReplyDeletewe have hendo and allen in that position
if we are spending 37m on a midfiolder i would activate draxlers get out clause
no benteke ,michu llalana are average
ReplyDeletebenteke is just a carroll , michu has second season syndrome and llalana is overpriced for his age
we need players like shaqiri,draxler,shaw
young proven players we are going to be in cl
liverpool should keep their defence simmilar
ReplyDeleteskrtel has been a beast , sakho is a top player , agger would want atleast one season in cl
and johnson same
sign just luke shaw and maybe a back up for skrtel
jamie who was that guy who marked suarez out of a uraguay game?
he sounds like a skrtel or ivanovic quality player
i dont know why people want to keep borini his goal scoring record for sunderland is poor and in hendo we have enough workhorses
ReplyDeleteassaidi also has been average for stoke
suso maybe keep him but i cant see him displacing sterling,draxler or coutinho
liverpiols loan system is also bad , iloris and ibe are not playing
rodgers needs to be held responsible for ruining their careers
Utd is crazy. Why spend so much money for a player who only played 30 games for Sporting? But good for them. Carvalho is definitely talented but not worth 37m.
ReplyDeleteLlalana is far from average. i would have him in LFC any given day. he is one of best english players out there, and it is not "big fish in small pond" thing. Saints are going to be finishing in top half of table this year, and for years to come. it is well ran club with great stock of young talent.
ReplyDeleteim crossing my fingers we pouch him instead of shaw this summer.
Its not Rodgers fault. Llori is getting game time, but like Ibe he's still young, his time will come. Borini and Assaidi are not good enough, but nothing to be upset about. Nothing is guaranteed when buying talented young players.
ReplyDeleteWe don't need to buy world beaters, we need to buy players with ability and hunger. I trust Rodgers enough now to improve the players we do get. We don't need players needing to play because of their price tag. We need them there because of merit, We need more athleticism and power in CM, another top FB, a top wide players and another striker. We also don't need to sell alot of players, other than down right failures. Im sure we are going to give the youngsters a chance to break through as well. Texeira, Ibe, Suso and maybe Wisdom.
ReplyDeleteLukaku will be on sale next year, why not him ?
ReplyDeleteAC syndrome...Drogba lite
ReplyDeleteDraxler???? Do you know something we don't?
ReplyDeleteShaw is too expensive. Anything above 15m is too much
ReplyDeleteAdding players of the calibre of willian and konoplyanka certainly wouldn't have made us any worse. Nobody could've conceived of how well we've done with this squad. The players have improved ten fold. Biggest signing FSG need to prioritise this summer is our managers new contract
ReplyDeleteIt might not be fashionable or vogue but I don't think that selling decent players for the so call next big thing/superstar is a wise move for us as
ReplyDeletea club to take...it's not play station football lads.
We've some very very good younger player's coming through, some
on loan gaining valuable experience at home and abroad. If we adopt the throw money at it policy which got us and a few other clubs into trouble then we may not get out of trouble again...more to the point If young talent see there is no way to gain access to the first team.
Then they won't bother to come or will lose heart ahem(Thomas Ince).
It might feel or look like the arsenal model and it probably is..but I doubt
we'll be as soft as that shower.World class players will come but it'd be more satisfying to CREATE our own world class players like we did with
Stevie G...I might be in a minority of one with these thoughts and I've had a good old drink with last weekend result let alone yesterdays.
The dreams on, the Mancs don't like it but I don't want to say we'll win it
yet, I've been down that road for 24 long years it's been a mare but now that certain events off the field are finally righting themselves (justice for the 96)..I sincerely do believe that this is our time.Shhh say it quietly one game at a time...ynwa!
If we should be buying anyone from Southampton this summer - It should be Jay Rodriguez - has managed to rack up 14 goals this season playing out wide which is impressive to say the least. Better prospect than Lallana imo - Luke Shaw sure, but only for the right price.
ReplyDeleteI wish some of our fans would stop banging on about these so called talented foreign players . I really hope our budget is spent on Lallana & Shaw, these two are ready for a higher level.
ReplyDeleteNo we are not like Arsenal, similar that we are creating and improving our own players. But if the Suarez situation was with Arsenal they would have chopped off the buyer's hand for that money. We have shown we wont be bullied and also we will pay players what they have earned and not sell them fro profit as soon as they have matured. Reports we are trying to double Sturridge's salary. And he would have earned that after reportedly taking a pay cut moving here.
ReplyDeleteAs for our transfer policy, we need to strike the right balance. We still need to get top talent to remain competitive particularly with the CL on the horizon, but we also need to fill out squad with our own players. I would never be totally happy to see our team look like City's or Chelsea's. The club need to always maintain its identity which is English.....and im not English btw. It makes me feel proud to see players like Flanno and Henderson...who got major flack, doing so much better and are key parts of the team now.
BTW if i was Rodgers i would be cheekily trying to unsettle Rodwell at City lol. Do you think these young English youngsters are thinking....maybe LFC is the place to go as a big club in England?
£20 million for benteke would be travesty. He simply isnt the BR type player. Once Borini is back we arent short in the striker department with Aspas also waiting in the wings. To spend 30 million on luke shaw would again be folly, considering we have flanagan who will only get better and enrique to come back next year. We maybe one or two players short to make a good impression in the champions league, but its not major surgery.
ReplyDeleteDraxler would be ideal for the type of football we play and with champions league certain we should be able to attract these types of players. Perhaps even huntelaar to complete a monster front 3!
aye Lukaku is much better than benteke but i doubt chelsea will sell to us - moses yes but not lukaku!
ReplyDeletewe said something similar a couple of years ago and ended up with carole, adam, and downing!
ReplyDeleteHaven't you learnt from a couple of years ago?
ReplyDeleteI was watching La Liga this morning, and I saw this real gem of a player I haven't seen before that Liverpool should sign. I think his name was Messi or something, but he's quite young (fits FSG's age policy), he's fast, has great vision, and he really gave the RM defenders a hard time- he scored a hattrick! He'd be a bargain buy if you ask me...
ReplyDeleteI hope we go back in for Kono.
ReplyDeletednt know why people think Southampton will just unload their best players without a fight
ReplyDeleteIn regards to failed/new signings, who would not want to play alongside Suarez at this particular time and form ??. Those who rejected will just have to live with their regrets.
ReplyDeletemessi is better than ronaldo on 1 leg mate!
ReplyDeleteRead that. Was a bit puzzled since i didn't think you could sign players outside of a window unless they were released by their clubs or without a club to begin with. Looked him up, seems a bit slow and heavy to me. 37 million for a 21 year old? This page would be in uproar if we did that.
ReplyDeleteWe did sign Sakho and that hasn't, in the end, influenced Agger and Skrtel so signing Konoplyanka and Willian would not have held back Henderson and Sterling if they'd been good enough.
ReplyDeleteI think we'll still aim for that class attacking midfielder or winger. Maybe it will come down to who is available. We tried for Mkhitaryan who plays the 10, Cost who is a striker and Willian who is a left sided attacking player. Konoplyanka is also a left winger, right? Any of them would have added to us, it's a bit silly to argue otherwise, I think Molby is just trying to make an interesting point. But after all that has happened this season I'd say that we still want to have another quality attacking player in the team and there will be a chunk of money put aside for just that. A player who can fit anywhere in the forward line and also in the 10 role - there are a few candidates already being mentioned and I would not be at all surprised to see us spend about 20 million.
ReplyDeleteWhat's great about not signing those players is how guys like Henderson and Sterling have grown with the responsibility that has been given to them. They are both massively improved. Henderson is becoming a real class midfielder, his passing game is starting to show itself. The maturity and skill from Sterling is ever increasing and he's a real find for us. To have these guys perform so well means that if we do sign someone top drawer we've suddenly got some frightening depth to call on. We'll need that if we're in Europe and also want to compete for domestic cups.
more than those, I think, missing out on salah is the bigger miss. For the lesser money he is or can be as good or better than those. Salah would have certainly been a signing of the kind of coutinho/sturridge
ReplyDeleteI'd be taking a look at lazar markovic at benfica. 20 yrs old, will likely cost upwards of 20 mill but gonna be absolute class.
ReplyDeleteGuys got a bit of everything. He's meant to be a winger/forward but he could be turned into one of the best sitting midfielders in the world I reckon. Long term gerrard replacement and could fill in further forward in the mean time.
why not reus?
ReplyDeleteHuntelaar is 30...long in the tooth for a striker. Aspas will always be waiting in the wings I fear. He just doesn't have the drive or killer instinct to grab ahold of a match and win it. Borini has the drive and instinct, but I'm not sure he has the talent. Draxler is on a team that will be in the UCL again next year. Not sure he would want to go to another team.
ReplyDeleteWe are not one or two players short. We need more and better players to survive the LC/PL/FA/CL season. We have players who are not playing for a reason: Alberto and Aspas and Kelly. We have Toure who is rapidly reaching his shelf life. We have players on loan who aren't getting first team football on lesser teams: Llori and Assaidi. These are roster holes that must be filled with more dependable talent to spell the first team in other competitions and who have the capacity to win matches on their own without help.
We're not close to being a team like Chelski or City...not yet, but I believe BR will get us there.
It's not about foreign players or domestic players, it's about the right players. Personally I don't care if LFC is going to be like Chelsea or City, since we still have a history and tradition and what's important is the RED spirit and the will to play for the jersey not the name. Going back in history, during the Benitez era, we signed a lot of good players and most of them were foreign. After the departure of Benitez many of the players left and those who stayed became demotivated. Yes, Hodgson was probably the main reason for that, but still the team above anything else.
ReplyDeleteBR and FSG have said publically that they will not splash the cash during the summer transferwindow and BR is thinking we are a year ahead according to his own goals. However we still need to continue to build the team. You can take any player from City and they would strengthen our team "on paper" - but there are not so many that could work out the other way around - which is proof that we need to strengthen the squad.
LFC biggest problem is money management and it's one of the key reasons why we haven't won the league in odd 20years. I hope to break that duck as quickly as possible. But we need star players with talent and these type of players costs money - a lot of money.
Spending odd £20m+ on Illori, Aspas, Assaidi, Borini, Alberto is not going to cut it. No one of these players makes our squad stronger and it's a lot of money to be wasted. Especially the Alberto story - which to me is mindblowing. Since I read an article about it somewhere on the net? We had SUSO already in the team? Why to loan him out and buy Alberto? It makes no sense!
We can manage next year/season with a few additions - meaning not to splash the cash, but it won't take us the whole way winning the league. But a top four position could be enough. We really need Wingbacks on both sides - mostly for competion within the team. We need a strong centerback pairing that works the whole season and not injury prones and we need wingers. Preferably a Def.midfielder as well.
I can personally accept that we will only strengthen with 2-3players and get to another top4 position and the knockout stages of CL! And then in the season of 15/16 depending on circumstances try to mount a title challenge.
Peace - YNWA
you have to remember that a striker of high calibre isnt going to join us to sit on the bench. So someone like Huntelaar reaching his twilight years would do a great job - similar to say eto is for chelski.
ReplyDeleteThe one player that chelski or city have that we dont is a toure or matic. Henderson does a similar job perhaps without toure's goal threat.
Wow, to write it and read it is something:
ReplyDeleteDCosta.... passed for CL
H Myktarian (or however ya spell)... passed for CL
Willian.... passed for CL
Salah. . . held tuff on negotiations too long
Kono . . . held tuff on negotiations
I can only speculate how much FSG will cringe when the prices inflate this summer bc the WC. I can see them digging in and waiting again all the way thru.
Rakitic is the player we want, he has not signed a new contract at Sevilla yet, and Sevilla have scouted Suso a few times, a deal would be great.
ReplyDelete