17 Feb 2015

Confirmed: Werner reveals the 8 members of Liverpool's 'excellent' Transfer Committee. Concerning?

Liverpool's infernal transfer committee is the subject of constant debate amongst LFC fans, but who actually sits on the committee? No one connected with LFC has ever specifically confirmed the exact composition of the committee, but in a recent interview, Chairman Tom Werner finally revealed fill details of what he calls Liverpool's 'transfer group'.

Last season, Ian Ayre outlined the basic structure of the committee. He told Sports Illustrated:

"We have a head of analysis, a head of recruitment, a first-team manager, myself. All of those people are all inputting into a process that delivers what a director of football would deliver.”

The committee is much more expansive than Ayre's four-man version, though. Speaking to the Liverpool Echo, Werner hailed the allegedly 'excellent' work of the group, and argued that the work done so far is 'more favourable than some people have written about'.

Werner then named and shamed? the members of the group:

"Brendan Rodgers has played a key role in it [the committee] but it's also Michael Edwards [director of performance]; Dave Fallows [director of scouting]; Barry Hunter [chief scout]; Ian Ayre, as well as the work that John Henry, Mike Gordon [FSG] and I [Tom Werner] have done".

So there you have it. The transfer committee is composed of EIGHT people, with Rodgers having final say on which targets are pursued, and which players are ultimately signed.

It's good to have this finally on the record, but it's a little concerning to me that there appear to be four Suits on the committee with next to no experience of football (Ayre, Henry, Gordon, and Werner).

Indeed, Werner even references the 'work' he and his FSG colleagues have done re transfers, but hopefully he's referring only to the business side of things.

The idea of Werner and Henry - both of whom have zero real knowledge of football - trying to give Rodgers advice about transfers is, quite frankly, laughable, and a little bit terrifying.

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27 comments:

  1. But they don't do they? They give 'advice' as to the budget available and there's certainly been a lot available over the last few years. In essence this much fabled 'transfer committee' s basically the same system as most clubs but with a fancy name. A manager, scouts, numbers men, money men and a negotiator. Hardly revolutionary.

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  2. I would assume the suits will deal with the business rather than offering advice on who to sign. I assume they have a large input on the profile of player that we target though

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  3. The people with "zero experience in football" provide the cash I suppose, from a business perspective, they would decide how much to spend on who. If Rodgers gets to identify which targets are pursued and ultimately bought, then the only concern would be if they were sanctioned or not. I'm not overly concerned by them, wouldn't go as far as describing them as laughable, terrifying....I might be a little more concerned about the ones who actually have football experience in that list who may have a direct hand in scouting and identifying who the team needs.

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  4. how come any problem at lfc and you make it sound like lfc are on the brink of disaster.Way too much whinging like a little bitch on this website

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  5. Werner and Henry set the brief, ie, early 20s and low wages and the rest work to that. Rodgers says who he wants and Ayre goes and gets someone else. Simples

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  6. Did your mum or dad christen you with that name?

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  7. Actually Tom Werner names exactly the same people Ian Ayre did (bar the chief scout) adding only the 3 people from FSG who in truth aren't really involved if only to discuss available funds I suppose, hence why Ayre didn't name them in the first place.
    You can clearly see he sets the FSG guys quite apart from the rest: "as well as the work..."

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  8. I'm pretty sure I read this ages ago but perhaps it wasn't anyone from the club saying it.

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  9. It's been pretty common knowledge for a while, but the club usually shies away from the specifics of the committee.

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  10. It's laughable because it probably isn't true Jaimie. You take a lot of things too literally. They'd be on the business side. That's it.


    Rodgers may get final say, however it goes a lot deeper than what it looks like on the surface. If the 3 other football guys on the committe really want one player, but Rodgers wants another, do you really think it'd be that easy for him to make a captain's call and pursue his own target?

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  11. I don't see a problem. The suits have to be involved because they handle the money. Leave the football to the football experts and the business dealings to the businessmen. But of course at some point they have to work together and I think it's good to see that Werner, Henry and Gordon are actively involved. It means that they are signing off on these players and so when things don't go so well it's a group responsibility. It also means that the owners have their finger on the pulse of what's going on at various levels of the club. They're not just sitting back waiting for results to start coming and then ignorantly demanding things they have no clue about.



    Ayre - Has to be involved because he's signing the deals and negotiating the contracts. He needs to know about the players so the more he talks to the scouting team the more educated he is when speaking with selling clubs and agents. He also needs to be there to talk about budget, how much the club can afford and how much the selling club is demanding.


    Henry/Werner - Have to be involved because they own the club and it's ultimately their investment on the line. The would need to sign off on any deal so the more they know, the more they are involved, the better educated they are. They can also push the football brains to account for their decisions, help rationalise the reasons why we do or don't want to sign a player. In the simplest terms these guys are just smart businessmen who have made a ton of money. You want to have people like that at least partially involved.


    Gordon - If I'm not mistaken he's essentially Ayre's boss and in the absence of Henry and Werner is the man who's really running the club at the top level. I'd suggest he, Henry and Wener are mostly interchangeable i.e. you could just called them "FSG" and I'd doubt we'd see them often together in the same meeting. Note that Werner even speaks of himself, Henry and Gordon in that way, as if they are a single unit.


    The way I see it you'd typically have the 4 man team of football brains, Ayre and then Gordon. That would be the set of people who need to sign off on a transfer. Henry and Werner will be involved when they can but they are busy men and I don't see them being there all that much. Overall it seems pretty sensible to me.

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  12. So Henry is the Father, Werner is the Son, and Gordon is the Holy Spirit?

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  13. Praise be to FSG, for on the 4th day he brought us transfer funds and sponsorship deals. On the 5th day he built a new Main Stand and on the 6th day a new Anfield Road. One the 7th day he sat in the new directors box with a pint of larger to watch the Merseyside Derby and he saw that it was good.

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  14. On the 8th day he bought Messi

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  15. Let's not forget that these guys in FSG also run a successful baseball franchise in Boston. It may be a different sport but at the end of the day many of the concepts are still the same: identifying talent, player development, big name signings, contracts and salaries, player egos, translating squad strength into on-field performance and how to manage all of that without running a loss. Doing that well on a grand scale is what makes the Red Sox a competitive franchise and clearly Henry and the boys know what they are doing. Plenty of that knowledge will transcend sport and no, I'm not talking about money-ball. It's just that running a successful sports club at the top tier is a huge challenging and we shouldn't discount the success those guys have had in the USA despite that fact that it wasn't a football team.

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  16. Sure, Gordon, Werner and Henry...now I know how Balotelli really ended up at OF F.

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  17. Jaimie , I would be far more concerned about Fallows, Hunter and Ayre seeing Rodgers poor transfer record .
    Its good news to know that Henry takes a personal interest in the players movement

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  18. This poor transfer record is becoming a fallacy. No club gets every transfer right. Southampton and West Ham appear to have bought will this season, but will their players do it longer term.

    Sturridge, Coutinho, lallana, can, Markovic, moreno, Sakho
    all looking like good long term purchases.

    Failed purchases look likely to get a decent return back due to transfer policy. This is always overlooked. Assaidi we end up making money on. Borini we were offered more money for. Aspas doing well in Spain and likely to get 5-6m for. Ballotelli big risk but unlikely to sell for less than 12m.

    Our transfer policy is actually looking very good

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  19. Rodgers could have said no to Balotelli but he didn't. Was Balotelli the only striker that was on the shortlist? The mind boggles.


    Cannot believe there are some who want to blame Ayre who handles the contract side of things. Unless he changed his job description overnight to Director of scouting?

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  20. As you say this is very similar to how English clubs have always done transfers. The manager speaks to his scouts about players (or what is the point of having scouts) and then talks to the moneymen to see if the selected player transfers will be sanctioned. The only difference is that it might be discussed together around one big table

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  21. With the frequency that your mind boggles about Rodgers, you should have died at least 10 times by now.

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  22. He did say that he'd ran out of options with the budget and it was gamble on balo or not bring anyone but he felt we were light up top

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  23. “This transfer represents outstanding value for the club and I think we have done a really smart piece of business here,” the former Swansea City manager said.

    “There is no doubting Mario’s ability; he is a world-class talent and someone who, for such a young age, has vast experience of playing at the very highest level.”



    That is what Rodgers said when Balotelli was signed and there of course to sugar coat were not other options other than Balotelli?


    Excuse after excuse.

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  24. I am not going anywhere ;-)

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  25. That's true. The actual processes are still a bit misty. Not sure why my post was taken down.

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