navbasi

THIS.

can't see anything getting officially announced with us still needing to wrap up the title

Edwards will be given a prominent position within the club, which would see him lead football operations Chris Bascombe 12 March 2024 • 9:00am Michael Edwards, one of the key architects of the Liverpool renaissance led by Jurgen Klopp, is returning to the club in a senior role. After months of talks between Edwards and the club’s owners, Fenway Sports Group, the former sporting director has agreed to assume a critical position to help preserve and enhance the football legacy in the post-Klopp era. Edwards will not return as the new sporting director, a position he gave up in 2022 after ten years as one of the most influential figures in an acclaimed recruitment team. Instead, he will oversee football operations and his first priority will be to appoint a sporting director, with Richard Hughes expected to join him this summer having announced his imminent departure from Bournemouth. Edwards will be reunited with others’ who have been crucial in building a Liverpool squad which for the second time in three seasons is competing on all four fronts entering the final months of the season, chief scout Barry Hunter and Head of Recruitment Dave Fallows among them. Luring Edwards back to Liverpool is a coup for FSG, and ends a prolonged period of negotiation led by John W. Henry and Michael Gordon. Gordon, another vital component moving forward who remains in charge of club strategy, was determined to bring Edwards back and considered it of paramount importance given the huge void that will be left by Klopp. Liverpool know it is vital to get the managerial appointment right, but also feel stability behind the scenes has been fundamental to the club’s successes since 2015. There has been a danger of a ‘brain drain’ with Klopp taking his backroom coaching staff with him when he departs at the end of this season. Edwards’ comeback means those who have put the structures in place to ensure the coach had the tools to work his magic ‘front of house’ can appoint and help Klopp’s successor, whoever that might be. As Telegraph Sport reported last Wednesday, Edwards’ earlier resistance to a return significantly softened following the last of many fresh Liverpool approaches and he agreed to a face-to-face meeting in Boston with Henry and Gordon to hear how his new role will differ from the last. During his 20 months away from Liverpool, Edwards has been one of the most sought after sporting directors in world football and has turned down several chances to return to the Premier League, Chelsea among those who wanted him. Liverpool tried at least twice to bring him back. Mastermind behind club’s most successful transfer deals His reputation follows a prolonged spell of successful transfer activity, both buying and selling. On Edwards’ watch, Liverpool famously signed Philippe Coutinho from Inter Milan for £8.5 million before selling him to Barcelona five years later for £142 million. The proceeds of the sale directly contributed to Liverpool signing Alisson Becker and Fabinho, on top of the £75 million record-breaking deal for Virgil Van Dijk. Liverpool won the Champions League, Premier League and World Club Cup over the following 18 months. There were countless other deals which confirmed Edwards intuitive understanding of how to maximise value in the transfer market, Liverpool winning admiration for how they have stuck to their principles, often walking away from deals when the price is not right, as well as maximising their profits from the squad players they have allowed to leave. Naturally, Edwards most important task alongside Gordon is to decide on the next manager, with Xabi Alonso remaining the favourite but several other candidates under serious consideration. Liverpool were eager to finalise the key executive appointments before pressing ahead with formal approaches to those most suited to continuing Klopp’s outstanding work.

Allegedly these are the leaked texts… https://drive.google.com/drive/mobile/folders/1OlV2wb51s1WhjLFq0Lsp4inRU60qvdhY

The Allez Allez in extra time was something else… It just got louder and louder and louder… It will live with me for the rest of my days how we pushed the lads over the line today…. No other club, no other fanbase could have done that… It was our YNWA Istanbul half time moment….

Wataru Endo, Liverpool’s £16m bargain who has left Caicedo in the shade By James Pearce Wataru Endo’s eyes light up as he contemplates what lies ahead in the Carabao Cup final. “I’m so excited to play at Wembley,” he says. “I heard that 90,000 people will be there to watch. It will be my first time at such a special stadium. It would mean a lot to me to win my first title with this club.” Liverpool’s late bloomer has exceeded all expectations since completing a surprise £16million ($20.2m) move to Anfield from Stuttgart last summer. On Sunday, the Japan international will come face to face with the man who played a pivotal role in ensuring that, at the age of 30, he belatedly realised his Premier League dream. If Moises Caicedo had been swayed by Liverpool’s advances after they had a club-record offer of £111m accepted by Brighton in August, chances are Endo would still be in the Bundesliga. But Caicedo opted for Chelsea and, after Southampton’s Romeo Lavia did likewise in a £53m deal, Jurgen Klopp responded by turning to a holding midfielder he had admired for years. The reaction among the wider fanbase to the identity of Fabinho’s replacement was initially underwhelming. With Liverpool’s options dwindling fast, some viewed Endo as a panic buy. But, internally, senior Anfield figures never saw it that way. The data highlighted Endo as one of the Bundesliga’s best-performing midfielders in key metrics such as duel success, winning possession, tackles and attacking sequence involvements. The character references obtained by interim sporting director Jorg Schmadtke were glowing. As well as his leadership and work ethic, Endo’s durability was viewed as a major plus given he had sat out just three league matches over the previous three seasons combined. Liverpool pointed to the four-year contract they had given Endo as proof he wasn’t viewed as a short-term fix. Despite the ongoing speculation, there was never any chance of them recruiting another specialist No 6. Six months on, how the tone has shifted. Chelsea’s celebrations over that expensive double triumph in the transfer market have long since fallen silent. They sit 25 points adrift of Klopp’s table-topping side. For a seventh of the price of Caicedo, who has struggled to live up to his price tag, Endo has given Liverpool so much more bang for their buck. As for Lavia, he’s made just one substitute appearance for Chelsea in a campaign blighted by injury and remains sidelined. “My god, were we lucky, eh?” said Klopp when speaking at the Anfield Road Stand test event in December. “We obviously realised that other central defensive midfielders don’t want to join Liverpool and then we found Endo.” Some perceived it as a dig at Caicedo and Lavia, but Klopp was focusing on the good fortune of having such an effective backup plan after missing out on two targets. Understandably, Endo needed some time to settle. There were four days between the call he received from his agent about Liverpool’s interest and his debut against Bournemouth. He didn’t have the luxury of a pre-season under Klopp. The pace and physicality of the game required an adaptation period, as did the manager’s desire for his No 6 to operate higher up the field than Endo had been used to. He only started one league match before mid-November, with Alexis Mac Allister preferred in the holding role. Shy and unassuming, Endo slowly came out of his shell around the training complex and grew in stature. Klopp and his staff have regularly reinforced to him that he belongs at this level. Endo, who has four children, was snubbed by J1 League clubs as a youngster before playing in Japan’s second tier, then launching his career in Europe in the modest surroundings of Sint-Truiden in Belgium, and then going from benchwarmer to adored skipper at Stuttgart. He is no stranger to digging deep to prove people wrong. He has clocked up 27 appearances (20 starts) for Liverpool in all competitions this season and that figure would be higher but for the seven matches he missed during his involvement at the Asian Cup in Qatar last month. His return to Klopp’s side has enabled Mac Allister to operate further forward, with Endo excelling as the defensive shield. “It’s hard to play for Liverpool. There’s always a lot of pressure,” he says. “Playing in the Premier League is tough but this is something I wanted for a long time. I try to make sure I enjoy it and do my best every time. “I’ve developed and improved over the season and that has helped to give me more confidence.” His combative performances in this month’s wins over Brentford and Luton Town bode well for Wembley. Against Luton, he completed 50 of his 53 passes (94 per cent) and created three chances. He won possession on six occasions, with Virgil van Dijk (seven) the only Liverpool player to better that figure. “We’ve lost a lot of players to injuries but the win against Luton showed that we still have good players available,” Endo adds. “We’re very much together as a team. “The fans have been amazing to me since I arrived. The atmosphere was crazy in the second half against Luton.” Endo was away on international duty when the news broke about Klopp’s decision to step down at the end of the season. He believes the manager’s impending farewell will continue to galvanise the dressing room. “I was sad when I heard about it,” he says. “I really enjoy playing for him and playing football the way he plays. Others have been here a lot longer so maybe have more emotion but he has helped me so much. “It’s disappointing but I want us to achieve titles for him before he goes. Winning at Wembley would give us extra energy.” Having signed for Liverpool after the draw at Stamford Bridge on the opening weekend of the season and been in Qatar when Mauricio Pochettino’s side were hammered 4-1 at Anfield last month, Sunday will be the first time Endo has faced Chelsea. He will be surrounded by an array of more expensive purchases at Wembley but he is proof that you do not have to pay sky-high prices to find the perfect solution to a problem.

Real Madrid ask to move final La Liga fixture for Taylor Swift tour Real Madrid have filed a request to La Liga to move their final game of the season to enable more time to set up for Taylor Swift’s concert at the Bernabeu the following week. Madrid are set to play Real Betis on Sunday May 24 before Swift’s Madrid leg of The Eras Tour takes place on Thursday May 30. The club have asked for the fixture to be moved to an earlier date, with Saturday May 23 in mind, to allow more time to prepare the stadium for the 34-year-old singer’s concert. Madrid are also attempting to find an additional date to host a second Swift concert in light of the interest they have received. There are complications over whether the request will be granted given both teams could still have something to play for heading into the final round of La Liga fixtures. The title race could go down to the final game of the season, with Madrid six points ahead of second place Girona, while Betis could remain in contention for a European place. Betis sit seventh in La Liga, one point behind Real Sociedad in the league’s final European spot. Madrid would need to play their final league fixture at the same time as Girona and Betis would need to play at the same time as the other teams in contention to qualify for Europe in the interest of sporting fairness. Swift is set to visit a number of football stadiums as part of the 2024 tour, including Liverpool’s Anfield, Wembley Stadium in London and Lyon’s Groupama Stadium. Concerns had been raised over her Lyon dates, with the risk of them clashing with the Ligue 1 relegation play-off. Lyon sit three points above the Ligue 1 relegation play-off place.

It’s just a joke, not a single fuck is given. They do exactly what they want and if anyone challenges them, their army of lawyers tie whoever questions them in knots…

Jonathan Northcroft - The Times Jürgen Klopp’s human side forced him to walk away from Liverpool Football on Merseyside and throughout the nation will lose so much more than a manager when the German leaves the Anfield dugout this season Liverpool and English football are going to lose more than a football manager. That was obvious when another friend visited Liverpool city centre in the hour after Klopp announced he was leaving the club after this season, describing it as “the world’s biggest funeral — just men staring into their phones”. It was obvious from the reaction of Klopp’s biggest rival, Pep Guardiola, who said with sad warmth, “I have this feeling that he’s leaving part of us at Man City too.” At Anfield, at Sunday’s FA Cup tie with Norwich City, the noise, tears and banners will make it glaring. It was telling, in the video he recorded for supporters, that Klopp, 56, spoke of finding ways to explain his decision to his wife, Ulla. She loves Merseyside and their life in the coastal village of Formby and persuaded him to stay when he was close to quitting midway through last season. Fatigued and mindful of his health, Klopp found 2022-23 a “dog year”, as he put it in his press conference on Friday. He needed to rebuild his team, especially its midfield, and was fed up with the relentless schedule and noise. Among experiences that disillusioned him was one where, during Liverpool’s defeat at Old Trafford in August, a Liverpool fan stood behind Ulla yelling negatives about him throughout the game. He was snapping at benign journalists in press conferences and overseeing performances that baffled him, like a 3-0 defeat against Wolves for which, he said afterwards, “I have no words.” But, with Ulla leading those who encouraged him to continue, Klopp regathered his fight and threw himself into the job with fresh energy, pushing Liverpool up the table and with help from an interim sporting director recruited to assist him — an old associate, Jörg Schmadtke — overhauled his squad, buying an entirely new midfield. This season evokes even more parallels with Sir Alex Ferguson: a managerial tour de force where sharp recruitment, leadership and brilliant decision-making (witness the boldness and extraordinary impact of Klopp’s substitutions) has put a non-vintage Liverpool top of the league just as Fergie did with a non-vintage Manchester United in his final campaign. But the underlying tiredness didn’t go away. It was also telling that the moment which made Klopp realise it was time for a break came when he sat down with staff to plan the next pre-season. He had the sudden thought, ‘What if I’m not here?’ and found it not daunting but enticing. It’s “just the stuff you have to do next to it [the football],” Klopp said, explaining what drained him. An experienced fellow manager understands. “It’s the decision-making that tires you out. ‘What time are we eating dinner?’ ‘When’s the team meeting?’ ‘Where are we staying?’ ” he says. On top of this there are media demands that have “gone to a totally different level in the past five years”. Before games there are press conferences and interviews with rights holders which, in an age saturated with content, are getting ever more left-field and demanding. Nobody wants a quick sit-down discussing team news any more — broadcasters want to take you on a walk round the training ground, throw a quiz at you, ask quirky lifestyle stuff, in the attempt to “get something different”. Quickly, that becomes grating and time-consuming. After games a manager — especially of a club with Liverpool’s profile — will routinely have ten and more media assignments, hopping from podium to pitch-side podium for post-match broadcast interviews with domestic and foreign rights holders before doing radio, club channels and their post-match press conference. Then there is the increasing complexity of coaching, analysis, recruitment and dealing with players. And logistics. In the Europa League, Liverpool are having one of those dreaded Thursday-Sunday-Thursday-Sunday seasons while maintaining runs in both domestic cups. The past week typified the toll on personal schedules. Liverpool had a late Sunday afternoon kick off in Bournemouth and couldn’t fly home from there (for the second time this season) because of storms. Players were couriered home in luxury vans but for everyone else, including coaching staff, there was a five-hour bus journey back to John Lennon Airport, where their cars were parked, and then for Klopp another 90 minutes’ drive home. He got in close to 1am, had training the next day, then the next was on the road again — to London where, on Wednesday, Liverpool played Fulham. At a League Managers Association conference before Christmas the keynote speakers included a brain expert who talked about sleep, a psychologist, a heart specialist and a business guru whose presentation was about reinventing yourself in middle age. This is a profession under increasing strain, increasingly conscious of workers’ need to look after themselves. The reaction from those who know Klopp well is unanimously “good for him”. “He’s superman but people love him because he’s everyman, yet that means he has everyman issues,” one said. In the summer he became a granddad for the first time and is besotted with the child, a boy, yet has only seen him in snatched moments because (born to his stepson, Dennis) he lives in Germany. At Klopp’s press conference it was poignant when he said, “I don’t want to wait until I’m too old to have a normal life” but also “I don’t know how normal life is. I have to figure it out.” This is a guy who became a father at 20, when he was playing amateur football, attending university and doing 6am shifts in a warehouse to pay for his studies. “I had to become a very serious person at a young age. All my friends would be calling me to go to the pub at night and every bone in my body wanted to say, ‘Yes! Yes! I want to go!’ But, of course, I couldn’t go,” he recalled. From there he went into professional playing and, for the last 24 years, the consuming world of coaching. He told Mike Gordon, president of Fenway Sports Group and the ownership’s man running Liverpool, of his intentions in November. Their bond is incredibly close and after establishing there was no chance of Klopp reconsidering, Gordon understood. However the players didn’t know until Klopp called a meeting before practice on Friday and told them in a dressing room at the training ground. Staff received an email and then the video for supporters was released. Recorded in one take on Thursday, it was unscripted with Klopp wearing the gear of a normal middle-aged bloke — jumper, jeans and trainers. A nod to the civilian life he can’t wait to try on for size. Liverpool have lost just one league game this season and even then it involved a VAR farce that went against them. The unknown is how this news will affect players but, when Liverpool try to fill what Jamie Carragher suggests will be a post-Klopp “vacuum”, finding someone who can captivate footballers in quite the same way might be impossible. Ralf Rangnick described Klopp to me as a “menschenfänger” — a German word to describe charisma that literally means “people-catcher” — and nine seasons of listening to players speak about the Liverpool manager has brought home how special he is in this regard. Ibrahima Konaté told me about facing a choice between Liverpool, Chelsea, Manchester United and Real Madrid and having his mind made up by a video call with Klopp. “I watched nothing else but his eyes. And I saw sincerity,” Konaté said. Guardiola admitted on Friday that Klopp “would be leaving part of us at Man City” when he departed Then there was Jan Kirchhoff, recalling for me how it was playing for Klopp at Mainz. “When he comes into a room it feels like the room is full of him,” Kirchhoff said. “He has — as we call it in German — he is able to deduct his thoughts. That means really complex things, he is able to break [them] down into simple sentences. Into player language. So it’s easy to give him what he wants.” Yet Liverpool are losing someone who can do the ruthless side of leadership too. A fringe player who Klopp wanted to put in their place was told, “Listen, if my mum and dad hadn’t got together and had me you would never be a Premier League footballer”. Ask Mamadou Sakho, the former fan favourite who on a 2016 tour of the US delayed the squad’s outgoing flight by arriving at the airport late, was then late for a team meal, then didn’t show for a recovery session which impacted the schedule of physios. Klopp sent him home. Until a move to Crystal Palace, Sakho spent the next five months playing for Liverpool’s under-23s. Ilkay Gundogan tells a story of a ferocious dressing-down at Dortmund (Gundogan’s crime was breaking club rules by reporting for training with a muscle problem without giving the physios notice). Gundogan kept protesting that he was still OK to train until Klopp yelled at him: “Do whatever the f*** you want to do!” But later, Klopp sidled up on the practice pitch and put a big arm round his midfielder. “My friend, do you know why I was so angry? I just care about you. And I don’t want you to get injured,” Klopp said, giving him a hug. Liverpool are losing the captain of their culture, someone who stood up for the collective ethic in Doha when they won the Club World Cup in 2019. At the presentation, upon hearing fringe players might not receive medals, Klopp threatened, “OK, I will go there and when the Sheikh or whoever wants to give me a medal I won’t take it. Tell them I will kill the whole ceremony.” Extra medals were duly found. At the old training ground, Melwood, there was a portrait of Klopp made up of the names of every single employee who worked there and this is a manager who has the perhaps old-school view that his job is to carry everyone at the football club, whether in the football department or not. He set a tone at the end of his first season after Liverpool lost the 2016 Europa League final to Sevilla in Basel. With a whole room of employees moping at the post-match party Klopp strode across the dancefloor, grabbed the mic and said: “Two hours ago, you all felt shit. But now hopefully you all feel better. This is just the start for us. We will play in many more finals.” Then he broke into a rendition of, “We are Liverpool, tra la la la la.” What now? Billy Hogan, Liverpool’s CEO, promised that in the hunt for a successor the club will go through “the same process that brought us Jürgen”, which involved compiling a 60-page dossier on the German, drawn from info from journalists, players, colleagues and Liverpool’s then director of research, Ian Graham, who provided detailed statistical analysis showing that in all but two of 14 previous seasons as a boss Klopp had significantly overperformed given his budget. Michael Edwards, the former sporting director, even sat, anonymously, in a hotel where Klopp was staying, listening to him talking on the phone, to get a sense of his dealings with people. Though Edwards and Graham are gone, Gordon remains and crunching the numbers will be Will Spearman, Graham’s successor, well-apprenticed in the “Liverpool way” of using data. There is confidence at the club that the systems and knowledge in place will lead them to the right successor. Xabi Alonso is the early favourite and Roberto De Zerbi is in the frame but nobody should jump the gun. A year ago many were predicting Jude Bellingham was Anfield-bound but in pulling out of the race for him in order to spread their budget on four midfielders, not one, Liverpool showed themselves willing to risk criticism and go against fan and media opinion to make appropriate recruitment decisions. With that remarkable knack for finding the right phrase, at the right moment, and being at the same time both lighthearted and affecting, the grizzled, mellower (say managerial adversaries) Klopp mused at his press conference, “We are not young rabbits any more, we don’t jump as high as we once did”, and it spoke of a man who has seen a world only filled with football, but whose life has had room for too little else for too long. A few years ago, he mused about why we are all on this earth. He suggested life was “about leaving better places behind. About not taking yourself too seriously. About giving your all. About loving and being loved”. He has not gone yet but even if he left tomorrow how very thoroughly, at Liverpool, he has lived out that mission.

$1.6bn for 25% - $1.3bn to the Glazers and $300m to fix the leaky roof!! The club gets $200m on completion and then remaining $100m by the end of 2024.

I'm not sure how the members card works, but it's clear something needs to be done about tickets and how they are distributed... Like you say.. start with the phones registered.

Maybe the club should start with all these reseller sites like https://www.livefootballtickets.com/english-premiership/liverpool-tickets.html?gclid=Cj0KCQiA4Y-sBhC6ARIsAGXF1g5kc9j6rCxWvSci0DzWHMyUOAbL_U4_8kqUdRis6oH-XDueLsVvN88aAnoAEALw_wcB Where are they getting their tickets from? It can only be from STH/Members - buy up the tickets and then cancel the ST/Members card for whoever is responsible for selling them.. They wouldn't even need to buy all of them.. buy 100 and then when they cancel them, make a point of calling it out on the official site... I would suspect the remaining tickets would soon be taken off sale.. I don't think the club are that bothered though.. I was lucky enough to get a ST in the Kop (in 2011) after being on the waiting list since 1997, I would never risk losing my seat by selling it on a reseller site, if I can't make a game, it's sold back to the club for a credit towards next season's ST, obviously there are plenty out there who are happy to make 3/4 times face value.

I agree that he'll get 2nd IF he decides to stay and end his career here.. I can't see him getting past Rushie though. Add the 16 you've said this season, he would then need to score a minimum of 20 goals per season for the next 6 1/2 seasons.. at which time he would be 38 years old!

Just brilliantly brilliant... I always save the weekend pods for my long run on a Monday and when Dave started telling that story, I literally had to stop because that was some seriously funny shit!! I was so gutted that I missed out on this in real time when the tweets were being sent!!! Bravo Squire!

I've just had a few shirts delivered from here >> https://www.soccer04.com Highest quality, you would never know the difference.. It takes about 4-6 weeks for delivery though so don't panic if they don't turn up, they will!!! Mates have also go a load of stuff from here and all said the same thing, great quality products!