January Transfer Window 2016

[Arl arse]

The more gems Klopp plucks from obscurity for a pittance the better. Wether he spots them or not as long as they end up here and are good and good value for money. An arl arse keeper, cb and dm would do for starters.

They used to call me 'The Cat' in school, but I might be struggling nowadays like.

 

Fuck it I'll give it a go if you have faith in me.

[Trumo]

That just reinforces my point, really. We spend £20m on a position and there's a sense of bewilderment and outrage that it isn't then sorted for the forseeable future. Here's Man City's spending on strikers since the Mansour takeover:

 

Jo £18m

Robinho £32.5m

Santa Cruz £17.5m

Adebayor £25m

Tevez £25.5m

Balotelli £24.5m

Dzeko £27m

Aguero £38m

Jovetic £25.8m

Negredo £20.6m

Bony £28m

Total: £282.4m

 

This is a club with all of the money in the world to spend on fees, wages and scouting and yet the only one on that list who wasn't sold at a loss after a few years (besides Bony, who almost certainly will be) is Aguero, who cost more than we've ever spent on a player, is on higher wages than we've ever given to a player and whose status in the game is such that he was and is completely out of our reach, even if we somehow could afford him.

 

At the top of the Premier League, £20m is a speculative punt; the kind you will take 4 or 5 times and be happy if one of them works out for you. Anyone who thinks that going forward every £20m signing we make is going to be a massive hit is living in a dream land. If it was that easy, the 4 clubs in the league who have far greater resources than us would be hoovering them up, rather than spending £30m on squad players, £40-50m on elite teenagers and £60m on proven top class (which still doesn't guarantee success - see Di Maria at Man United).

 

They also bought Bellamy for £15m.

[TheHowieLama]

Really only two flops in that group.

[cuppatea]

They also bought Bellamy for £15m.

 

Sorry, forgot about him. That's £300m on twelve strikers in six years, seven of whom were fucked off out on loan within two years of arriving, with only £55m recouped in sales, despite only two still being in the squad now.

[Grinch]

Wish we made shite signings like Tevez, Negredo and Bellamy.

 

That very same Bellamy is one of the small handful of decent signings we've made the last few years.

[TheHowieLama]

Adebayor scored a goal every other game for them.

 

Balotelli banged them in for fun.

 

Would have definitely taken Dzeko off their hands, same with Jovetic.

 

It is actually a pretty good list of signings if you get by the first three when they were admittedly rudderless. The "net" there also forgets that they still own three of them - one among the top players in the world.

[Arl arse]

Wish we made shite signings like Tevez, Negredo and Bellamy.That very same Bellamy is one of the small handful of decent signings we've made the last few years.

Agree, the only player who really knew how to handle a 7 iron.

[TheHowieLama]

Christ during that same time we have bought Balotelli, Origi, Aspas, Borini, Lambert, Benteke, Andy Carroll - bet Dzeko alone scored more than all those fellas combined did for us. Shit Adebayor probably did as well.

Only Suarez came unequivocally good with Sturridge still in the shop.

[VladimirIlyich]

That just reinforces my point, really. We spend £20m on a position and there's a sense of bewilderment and outrage that it isn't then sorted for the forseeable future. Here's Man City's spending on strikers since the Mansour takeover:

 

Jo £18m

Robinho £32.5m

Santa Cruz £17.5m

Adebayor £25m

Tevez £25.5m

Balotelli £24.5m

Dzeko £27m

Aguero £38m

Jovetic £25.8m

Negredo £20.6m

Bony £28m

Total: £282.4m

 

This is a club with all of the money in the world to spend on fees, wages and scouting and yet the only one on that list who wasn't sold at a loss after a few years (besides Bony, who almost certainly will be) is Aguero, who cost more than we've ever spent on a player, is on higher wages than we've ever given to a player and whose status in the game is such that he was and is completely out of our reach, even if we somehow could afford him.

 

At the top of the Premier League, £20m is a speculative punt; the kind you will take 4 or 5 times and be happy if one of them works out for you. Anyone who thinks that going forward every £20m signing we make is going to be a massive hit is living in a dream land. If it was that easy, the 4 clubs in the league who have far greater resources than us would be hoovering them up, rather than spending £30m on squad players, £40-50m on elite teenagers and £60m on proven top class (which still doesn't guarantee success - see Di Maria at Man United).

Only 2 players over 30 million and one is a massive success. We've spent over 30 million on two strikers also and our first ended up being sold for a fraction of the price. Hell,we've even bought two of City's ex strikers ourselves and one was atrocious.

[cuppatea]

Adebayor scored a goal every other game for them.

 

Balotelli banged them in for fun.

 

Would have definitely taken Dzeko off their hands, same with Jovetic.

 

It is actually a pretty good list of signings if you get by the first three when they were admittedly rudderless. The "net" there also forgets that they still own three of them - one among the top players in the world.

 

Adebayor had one (admittedly decent) season in the first team before being frozen out of the side, hawked out on loan (as they continued to pay his enormous wages) and then sold at a £20m loss 2 years later. He was a fucking disaster for them, or would have been if they didn't have an endless pot of money.

 

Balotelli scored 30 in 80 before being sold at a loss. That's hardly "banging them in for fun".

 

Jovetic scored 11 goals in 2 years at the club and you could probably count his number of good games for them on one hand.

 

They've spent the last 3 years paying the former Barcelona sporting director a small fortune and arming him with an unlimited transfer and wage budget and their success rate in the market has been no higher than ours. In fact the only way they've found any success at all is with players out of our transfer and wage budget and who wouldn't come here regardless. It's a similar story with all of the top 4 in the Premier League, they either pay big on established quality that we can't attract or they take speculative punts in the £10-20m region and get as many wrong as we do.

[AngryOfTuebrook]

I don't believe for one minute that a transfer committee supercedes a manager, on the whole.

 

Sure, there will be times when the two collide. It might be a player that the manager really fancies but the committee don't see the merit in, for example Ashley Williams for £10m...but doesn't that show everything that's sensible about a committee?

 

The transfer committee are there to be convinced, and if a manager can't convince them to change their minds on a player then it's probably very, very likely there's good reason for it.

 

There will also be occasions where a committee feel they've found a gem but the manager disagrees. I think we can all cite Assaidi, Illori, Alberto, Texeiera, Yesil, Aspas, Can, Markovic, Origi, as good (or bad) examples of when that's happened. But all these gambles have inherent sell-on value tp the club compared with Rodgers' acquisitions such as Borini, Allen, Lovren, Balotelli, etc.

 

We made a profit on Aspas, we made a profit on Assaidi, and you can see many of those players being sold for more than they cost, with the exception of Markovic (at present).

 

 

I can't see the transfer committee having a problem with Klopp's targets, and if they did, Klopp can win anyone around with a hug and a wink. No, he's going to have full say on transfers, you can count on that.

Is Balotelli a Rodgers signing now?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/liverpool/11009536/Liverpools-Brendan-Rodgers-rejects-reports-that-he-wants-to-sign-Mario-Balotelli-from-AC-Milan.html

 

I've always been sceptical of this idea that there's a clear divide between committee signings and Rodgers's signings (not least because Rodgers was on the committee).  Too often, it's just been a convenient way for people to say that anything good in the last few years had nothing to do with Rodgers and all the shite was all his doing.

 

Still, meh.  Onwards and sideways. 

[eeyore]

He was never a Rodgers signing.

 

Rodgers was a car crash but you can't pin that on him

[VladimirIlyich]

They were all Rodgers signings. He was the manager so they are his signings.

Everybody who arrives here under Klopp will be his signings too.

[Russ Atmosphere]

Hope Klopp isn't buying half a squad, playing them for ten games, half out of position, telling the papers he never wanted them, then sending them straight out on loan.

[Trumo]

Balotelli banged them in for fun.

 

And what did he do in the actual games?

[stringvest]

They used to call me 'The Cat' in school, but I might be struggling nowadays like.

 

Fuck it I'll give it a go if you have faith in me.

 

that's because you were caught lying on the floor of the shower licking your own testicles.

[navbasi]

He was never a Rodgers signing.

 

Rodgers was a car crash but you can't pin that on him

Stevie in his book said that Rodgers came to him and said he was going to take a punt on Ballotelli as he felt he could get the best out of him. So he was signed with Rodgers blessing... If it had worked out I'm sure Rodgers would have been telling everyone about how he managed to do what everyone else failed to do and get Balotelli performing.

[Phoenix]

Stevie in his book said that Rodgers came to him and said he was going to take a punt on Ballotelli as he felt he could get the best out of him. So he was signed with Rodgers blessing... If it had worked out I'm sure Rodgers would have been telling everyone about how he managed to do what everyone else failed to do and get Balotelli performing.

He certainly did with Sturridge.

 

I imagine he will disown the signing again after his injuries though.

[billypilgrimnz]

They've spent the last 3 years paying the former Barcelona sporting director a small fortune and arming him with an unlimited transfer and wage budget and their success rate in the market has been no higher than ours. In fact the only way they've found any success at all is with players out of our transfer and wage budget and who wouldn't come here regardless. It's a similar story with all of the top 4 in the Premier League, they either pay big on established quality that we can't attract or they take speculative punts in the £10-20m region and get as many wrong as we do.

 

So what you are saying then is, if we were able to not be shit at spending money in the 15m to 20m range ourselves, we may in fact be able to compete after all? Interesting.

[El Dangerous]

He certainly did with Sturridge.

 

I imagine he will disown the signing again after his injuries though.

Didn't he go on about how he inspired Mario by getting him to do a bit of running in training after he looked a bit lively against Spurs on his debut. It was all down hill from there mind.

[aRdja]

.

[Lee909]

Liverpool Transfer News: Reds Eye Sensational Xabi Alonso Return, Latest Rumours

 

New Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp could pull off a masterstroke if he succeeds with an alleged bid to bring Xabi Alonso back to Anfield, while speculation linking Borussia Dortmund's Ilkay Gundogan continues to grow. It's been over six years since Alonso departed Merseyside for Real Madrid, but Italian website Tuttomercato reported the wheels are in motion to bring the ex-Spain international back to Liverpool next summer (h/t Goal.com). The report claims Bayern Munich have no intention…

 

The report claims Bayern Munich have no intention of extending Alonso's contract beyond next summer, meaning the playmaker would be available on a free transfer when his deal expires in June.

 

While it has been a long time since Alonso took his leave of Anfield, the midfielder showed he still holds an interest in their affairs by wishing Klopp well after assuming his place at the helm in October:

 

However, the German tactician is looking to mould a new generation of stars at Liverpool, and signing Alonso, irrespective of how much the fans may adore him, could be seen as something of a backward step.

 

The Spaniard is ready to turn 34 later in November, and it's understood the Reds would have to compete with the big-spending powers of Qatar and Major League Soccer were they to follow up any interest.

 

That being said, Alonso is still featuring prominently for manager Pep Guardiola at the Allianz Arena and has started nine Bundesliga games this season, making 15 appearances across all competition.

 

 

 

 

Do not play with my emotions. Just get it done

 

[J-V]

[Tony Moanero]

I think FSG are more than willing to back Klopp in the market his January.

 

Lest you forget, he hasn't made a signing yet, and it's every manager's right to expect a transfer window where they can bring their own players in.

 

In some ways, bringing Klopp in after the transfer window shut was a very clever move. It means he doesn't rush into make signings, and that he actually gets to grips with his squad and the division first, and then has time to identify the right targets and go after them in January and next summer.

 

Those two transfer windows will make or break him. The same as it does for almost every manager. Rodgers shot himself in the foot with the signings of Allen, Borini and Assaidi in that first Summer transfer window, and loaned in Sahin, and his subsequent signings of Coutinho and Sturridge the following January were excellent players but neither of them has gone on to become World Class players.

 

 

From the moment he got them signings wrong, we were always playing catch-up. Had any of Allen, Borini, Assaidi and Sahin been top class then we'd have won the league the following season.

 

If you bear in mind that Klopp only has a 3 year contract, it's vital he gets his first signings right. And to that end, I've no doubt that FSG have agreed to back him over a 3 year period in a pursuit of success. If we don't win anything in these three years then I can see FSG jacking it in, and rightly so, because they've been more than fair to this club in terms of money and now bringing in the BEST manager on the market.

 

 

I really think our failings come from chances created and not the strikers.

I think we could have Carlton Cole and Charlie Austin as striker options, and with a couple from Firmino, Goetze, Muller, Çalhanoğlu, or Fekir behind them they'd be getting 20 goals. Also Lars Stindl at Moenchengladbach has a knack for finding the net from midfield. Also, what about Ciro Immobile? A Klopp signing, didn't work out, but he's got that Pelle vibe about him and might suit this division.

 

I also wonder if he might have his eye on Krychowiak as a DM, as he's got a track record in spotting good Polish lads, and Sevilla are about to tumble out of the CL.

Yer ma.

[cuppatea]

So what you are saying then is, if we were able to not be shit at spending money in the 15m to 20m range ourselves, we may in fact be able to compete after all? Interesting.

 

It's not so much that we're shit at it (since none of the teams above us it are doing it any better than we are), it's that our fans expect us to consistently do what we did with Coutinho and Suarez, by signing world class £30-80m players for less than a third of that price. The players who are legitimately worth £15-20m are the ones our fans moan like fuck about not being good enough.