Firmino signing has put the spring back in our step

Be honest, when we were first linked with a move for Roberto Firmino last weekend, who actually thought there was a hope in hell we’d pull it off? To me it had “Memphis Depay” written all over it. We’d get our hopes up and then United would just click their fingers and he’d go running to Old Trafford, while Brendan would unconvincingly shrug and say “never wanted him anyway. We have other priorities”.

That didn’t happen, remarkably we actually managed to land him without any fuss. We didn’t even have to wait until the Copa America finished. Ian Ayre - yes, THAT Ian Ayre! - jumped on a plane and got the whole thing wrapped up in a day or two. I’m not gonna lie, I’m pretty stunned at how efficiently this operation seems to have been carried out. Maybe United weren’t actually as keen as was being reported or maybe we just wanted him more and pulled out the necessary stops to get him, it doesn’t really matter. It certainly won’t do the club’s damaged reputation any harm for people to think we beat United to his signature, regardless of whether it’s true or not.

I don’t really care either way and we’ll probably never know for sure anyway. I just like the way we got this one done quickly and relatively quietly. It wasn’t completely under the radar as it had been in the papers for a couple of days before (it’s virtually impossible to keep deals 100% quiet these days), but in modern transfer terms it was very discreet as usually these things drag out for weeks and are often played out in the public eye.

There didn’t appear to be any of the sort of haggling and penny pinching that have scuppered or delayed many transfers in recent years and this was carried out with the efficiency of old. It’s quite shocking really isn’t it? I didn’t think Ian Ayre & co had it in them. This is how it’s supposed to be done, we used to take this for granted but it rarely happens these days as the upper echelons of the club is infested with bunglers and phoneys. Some praise is warranted on this deal for a job well done, but let’s not get carried away. This is what they are paid to do after all.

At long last it feels like we are being run in the way a top club should be. There has been no talk this summer, only action. They’ve been getting the job done in a hurry. We’re not even in July yet and there’s five players in the bag already and Nathaniel Clyne should soon make it six. At least three of those signings will go straight into the first team and improve it fairly significantly, so something has clearly changed this summer. Perhaps they all know they’re on a final warning if they don’t get their act together?

When it was reported that Ian Ayre had flown out to Chile to finalise the deal the jokes immediately started about how he’d find a way to mess things up. It’s fair enough, Ayre’s record in recent years when it comes to high profile transfers has been pitiful so any criticism and cynicism is justified. Whatsmore, it will take more than just this deal to make people forget the years of bungling. Not just by Ayre, he may be the easiest and most obvious target (particularly as he's so dislikeable) but he isn’t the reason we didn’t get deals over the line, there’s plenty of blame to go around on that front.

Too many targets had been missed in recent years with various excuses used. No Champions League, being gazumped on wages, spouses wanting to live in the big smoke, we heard them all and it was wearing thin. So to finally land a top rated player for a big fee, with big wages, who was reportedly high on the wanted list of both Manc clubs is a much needed shot in the arm for everyone.
 
I could certainly get used to this level of competency. Of course we still have no assistant manager in place and you’d hope that would be rectified by the time pre-season training starts, but it would be churlish to quibble about that at the moment. 

Liverpool needed this. The fans needed this. Firmino may turn out to be a massive letdown for all we know, but as of right now this is exactly the kind of signing we needed to make for all manner of reasons. The fans have been more down in the dumps this summer than I can remember in my lifetime. Trust in the people running the club (at ownership and management level) to accomplish anything this summer was at all time low, and while they haven’t entirely redeemed themselves yet, could we have realistically expected any more so far this summer? They’ve exceeded my (admittedly low) expectations that’s for sure.

It’s going to take a hell of a lot more than the signing of one player to change the perception of the owners, Ayre, Rodgers and the rest of the committee, but it is a step in the right direction at least. Not just the identity of the player in question, but the manner in which the deal was done. Big fee, big wages and the kind of player that usually we’d have said was out of reach because we can’t offer Champions League football. Of course it’s surely being financed by the sale of Raheem Sterling, but so what. This is the kind of approach we should have taken with the Suarez money, so if lessons have been learned from that then good. Better late than never.

On the subject of Sterling, I could not be less bothered about him leaving. In fact I actively want it to happen now and would be pissed off if it didn't. I’m fed up of the circus around him, he’s simply not special enough to make me want to put up with it. With Suarez, I’d have accepted pretty much anything because he was incredible. If he mugged an old lady on the street I’d have just wanted us to weather the storm, let him do his time and then get him back on the pitch. Sterling? No, I don’t have the inclination to put up with any more of his indiscretions, however minor they may be. Truth be told I’d much rather have the £50m fee than have him in the squad next season, so the sooner he goes the better now.

Besides, we don’t need him anymore as where would he even play? We’ve got Firmino, Coutinho, Lallana and Ibe to fill in whatever position he was likely to play. Even if you want to make a case that he’s as good as if not better than any/all of the above, the difference is negligible and the £50m is surely of far more use to the club than Sterling.
 
Selling Sterling and getting Milner, Firmino and let's say, Carlos Bacca, for minimal further outlay (not including wages of course, although those are covered by the departures of Gerrard and Johnson) would be incredible business. So yeah, laters Raheem.

It’s mad really, I’m ridiculously excited about Firmino considering I’ve never actually seen him play. I haven’t even watched much in the way of youtube compilations either. I managed two minutes of one before I lost my internet connection on my phone and I never bothered going back to finish it. The two minutes I saw was enough to make me think he’s going to ace. It’s the summer though, you’re allowed to feel that way. There’s plenty of time for reality to kick us in the balls when they actually get on the field and shatter all of those pre-season hopes we had.

To me, Firmino was one of those mythical creatures who only exists in the world of social media and the TLW forums (see also Jackson Martinez). Any time we’d be linked with some Premier League based jabroni, I’d see lots of harrumphing and wailing about “FFS just sign Roberto Firmino”. I’d keep seeing his name over and over but didn’t really have a clue who he was. I’d see it so often though that recently I’d find myself saying it too.

My arl fella: “See we’re after that Benteke”
Me: “Waste of money. We should just go and buy Roberto Firmino”
My arl fella: “Who?”
Me: “Some Brazilian, he’s meant to be boss, some lads on the forum are always raving about him.”
 
Seriously, that happened.

Where will he play though? Don’t ask me, until a few days ago I thought he was a centre forward. Turns out he’s more of a withdrawn forward who can also play as a striker. That’s probably part of the attraction. If you sign two out and out centre forwards, you either have to play with two up front or leave one out. If you’ve got one quality out and out frontman and another who plays up front or in behind (or from the side) that helps a great deal. We had that with Suarez, we could move him around anywhere and still keep Sturridge up front.

I’m not usually big on stats but one that I saw on twitter did catch my eye. Only four players in the Bundesliga have made more tackles in the last couple of years than Firmino. That's a bit freakish, surely? How many number 10s have that in their locker? The pressing high up the pitch virtually disappeared from our game last season and it had a knock on effect on everything else. If we get that back, winning the ball high up the pitch and just swarming all over teams in the early stages of games, that will go a long towards getting us going again.

I’m not suggesting Firmino is going to be anything approaching as good as Suarez was (but we can certainly hope though) but if his introduction to the side helps us get back to the swashbuckling football of a year ago then he doesn’t need to be, he just needs to bring some similar qualities to the team and hopefully he can do that. Coutinho and Lallana are both good at harrying the opposition into mistakes but you need to do it in packs. With Henderson and Milner playing in midfield then depending on who we sign to play up front we will hopefully have that in our locker again. I expect Ings will be useful in this area too when he plays, I have no idea about Origi though, and if we're only playing one up front we may never even see him depending on who else we sign and whether Sturridge stays fit.

Another concern many of us had about the current squad is that we no longer have any genuine stars or players we can identify with. Suarez has gone, Gerrard has now gone, we’ve lost people like Carragher, Hyypia, Torres, Mascherano and Alonso in recent years too. There were no world class players in the squad for the first time in years. Loads of good players, but no real star quality.

Sterling has the potential to be one but he’d decided he was too good for us, so that only really left Coutinho, who’s not there yet but has shown enough to provide hope that he could be the next one. Now there’s Firmino too. He is hopefully ready to make the step up to the next level and really make a name for himself. Being able to pick up players just before they are ready to explode into being world class is something we need to do because we don't have the money to buy them once they get there.
 
Having two exciting young Brazilian attacking players in our side does at least make things interesting again. There’s some hope now at least, and if those two fulfil their potential and we add a goalscorer to the mix then we could be a right handful again. At least until they decide they can do better than us, but that's a bridge we'll have to cross when we get there.

There’s risk in every signing, but if you’re going to spend big then going for an attacking player who’s in the starting line up of an Argentina or Brazil (and isn’t named Fred!) is probably a good way to go. The big hope is that him and Coutinho will hit it off and become a great double act. Paddy and Vladi, only hopefully better. Coutinho probably played as big a part as anybody in making this happen, he’s genuinely happy here and seems to love Brendan, or 'Brendao' as he calls him. Most of our hopes rest with those two Samba boys now and will be good for Rodgers to once again have players that can play the game the way he wants.

None of us know how the signing of Firmino is going to turn out, but for now it’s put a spring back in our step. I’m all in on him because we needed this. We needed something to rid ourselves of that stink of failure and depression that had become unbearable. It’s amazing what one signing can do, as I’m almost looking forward to next season now. I say almost because we still desperately need a goalscorer and without one we’re not going anywhere. The funny thing is after them pulling this deal off, I’m suddenly more confident that they will get a decent striker now.
 
(hopefully I haven't spoken too soon there, and if they revert to type and we end up signing Charlie Austin on the last day of the window don't blame me!)

The signings we’d made so far were shrewd but uninspiring and how they looked at the end of the summer was always going to depend on who was brought in to join them. The swoop for Firmino has presumably made people feel more enthusiastic about Milner and Ings now? If we can get a top striker and a pair of full backs who don't shit themselves when they get in the opposing half then Rodgers might just have a shot at turning things around. The one thing I hope is that he clears his head this summer, decides how he wants to play and then just goes for it. If he’s going down, may as well go down swinging and by playing “Rodgeball”.

Even if Firmino turns out to be a huge disappointment, at least he’s ensured we’re not going to spend the entire summer being cynical and miserable!
 
 
Dave Usher
@theliverpoolway