Match Day Thread Champions League Group Stage: Liverpool Vs Sevilla

It's true that he backs the players until the point that he sells them. Publicly at least.

But you have to ask, given your points, that if he doesn't rate these players, why hasn't he replaced them? However, while a. top GK and CB would at least help reduce the goals conceded but until he changes how we play, it will never eliminate them.

 

I think Lucas is right - the manager publicly backing his players is expected. But he's tried to replace the dross in the team.

My gripe is that he's had plenty of time to have done this by now.

Klopp is here for the long term - he wants his number one targets - Keita sorted for next year and he clearly wants VVD. It's an exciting prospect if/once we get the number one targets if we're patient enough.

 

ah yes forgot about Solanke -though since at best he is only a fringe player i plead justified memory loss

AOC ? - think thats probably a fairly succinct version of my view on him.

 

It was a bit strange when Mignolet signed a new 5 year contract that was allegedly sanctioned by Klopp, but even a blind man can see he's not of the standard we require if we want to progress and the same goes for a few others.
Considering FSG only bought LFC to make money they seem to be happy making it off-field through sponsorship etc rather than on it with success.

 

bit harsh to blame FSG for contract extensions for Lovren & Migs as that will be down to the "football people" at the club . FSG's only involvement would be agreeing the payment at most- might not be involved at all as could just be in the purview of the club management as it was within their agreed budget.

 

Ah, but the "football people" are answerable to FSG and need the okay from them to do any football business, and apart from Klopp there are no football people behind the scenes.

 

Agreed mate Their transfer policy is really holding us back.

It doesn't help our managers that they obviously aren't allowed to buy players over a certain age for a decent transfer fee. It means we've closed ourselves off from the majority of top players on the market, especially in defence where its mostly experience that counts and all the top defensive players are over a certain age.

Look at the difference Matic made to Man Utd or David Luiz made to Chelsea last season, we wouldn't have been allowed to make those signings under FSG's policy.

 

Spot on

 

Also we don't pay top wages and then act surprised when top players like Suarez, Coutinho, Sterling, Can etc. want to leave.

 

We were ready to pay a world record fee for VVD who is 26.

We broke our then transfer record by spending £38m on Mo Salah who is 25.

I think the club are changing their philosophies by buying ready made players, but the general ethos should be to focus on young players like Ox and Keita.

In terms of wages - we had agreed personal terms with Lemar, VVD, Keita, Ox, Salah etc so it indicates we are prepared to pay competitive wages.

Looking at Coutinho - I don't think it's to do with money - he wants to play for his dream club.

Same with Can, he has the opportunity to play for one of the best teams in the world with juventus who are more likely to win trophies.

 

We paid the £38m because like other clubs we got the TV money Jimmy, I mean look how much Everton spent, so the club aren't out of pocket.
Fair do's if you're happy with the way things are though mate, I'll give credit to FSG for their stance on Couthinho though.

 

25 & 26 aren't really 'old' though are they?

In all of FSG's time here how much in transfer fees have we spent on players over 27?

 

Chelsea offered Ox 200k, Arsenal 180k, we offered 120k. He only joined us because he didn't want to be a wing back. We are in a different league financially to Arsenal, Chelsea, City, United etc. We are spending 35m less a year on wages than Arsenal, who are only 4th on the wage budget list of the PL. Not saying that you need to have the biggest wage budget to win but traditionally the teams that spend the most on wages win the trophies and get the top players. Since FSG have been here we've seen more top players leave then arrive and we've only won a single league cup. Exactly the same story with Spurs, they look good up to a point but when it comes to keeping top players they lose more than they bring in and they've won nothing, very similar to us in the same period.

 

True but 25/26 are prime ages - do we really need to go for any one older? Obviously it all depends on the player in question but the two players above are examples of FSG maybe slightly relaxing that policy..

 

No dispute that we can't compete financially with the likes of united city etc. But as we've seen - players do want to join us ahead of rivals. VVD is the classic example.

Also - every club is a selling club bar Bayern, Real, Barca - even though Barca got bullied this summer.

Even if we win the league or CL, our star players will leave. United won the CL I think and Ronaldo still wanted to leave. It happens - but at least now I have faith that we will replace our players with quality.

Coutinho most likely to leave next summer and we're targeting Lemar. We've signed Keita who will be immense IMO - he's already the best player in the Buli this season. And when someone like Mane leaves, no doubt we will have a target in mind.

 

I think that age might be prime for attacking players, defensive players as a general rule peak slightly later, I think.

 

True mate, I'm not too bothered when players want to go to Barcelona/Real Madrid, its more the losing players to the likes of Juventus, City etc. We shouldn't be losing players to these types of teams.

 

Yes, i don't agree with a lot of the things said about a lot of managers who are merely fending off individual critiques in post match conferences. Its their job after all.

But yes he's had a few windows now to remove the horribleness. but then he bought klavan like.... what I don't agree with is if theres no movement on a target and you cannot go back in like VVD then you must move on.

Keita, fine. I'm happy too. but it is 12 months on. Thats what it had to be so ok. He was bought as an ideal no 8 IMO so we've lots of players in the mean time.

Robertson v moreno... hmmmm..

To leave us with the 4 cbs we have though... my god.. and then no 6. Its crazy. If you want your no 1 thats grand but if your no 1 can't be got then waiting til the last day might work BUT.... you must do somehting or the whole season suffers and thats where we are at now.

 

But we have to admit, Juventus and City are stronger teams than Liverpool, and are more likely to win trophies than us (certainly at Juventus and they are strong CL performers).

It's a sad state of affairs but at least we're on the right track now.

 

City I agree, but Juventus? They are a massive club, the main Italian team. Bayern, Juventus, Barcelona and Madrid are the big teams and PSG will be joining that bunch shortly.