THIS TIME LAST YEAR, in the aftermath of Luis Suarez’s transfer to Barcelona, there was excitement at what Liverpool would do with the money. Inevitably, Brendan Rodgers was quizzed on spending big though the manager was quick to mention how any new additions would be strategic, not ‘just names’.
“Maybe for the media there is guessing how we spend the money but you only spend the money if the players are there. What we can’t do is spend for the sake of it. The players we’ve brought in are players we wanted anyway.”
There is a responsibility [to spend well]. I have always said at every club I’ve been at, the club’s money is my money. I work for the club. I’m there to serve the club and run it the best I can on the field and work with the owners off it. They know I push for the best players to come in and they trust how we work. I would not pay more than a value. If clubs sense there is an opportunity to get more out of us it won’t happen. We are very unified in how we work in that way.”
“There is money available but we know spending money does not guarantee success.”
The statement proved quite prophetic. Rodgers spent £107 million on seven players. Only one – Emre Can – could be defined as a success. The £16 million gamble on Mario Balotelli failed spectacularly with Rodgers seeming to lose patience with the volatile Italian within days of his arrival.
The Southampton duo of Adam Lallana and Dejan Lovren, brought in for a combined £45 million, struggled for much of the campaign with the latter dropped late last year. Another former Saint, Rickie Lambert, was signed at a discount price but was rarely used. When he was, it was as a target man – in contrast to his hugely successful role at St. Mary’s.
For Lazar Markovic, his debut season at Anfield will forever be remembered for the bizarre red card he incurred in the Champions League tie with Basel last December, seemingly summing up the underwhelming start to his Liverpool career. Rodgers often selected him as a wing-back, making it even harder for the 21 year-old, signed for £20 million, to make an impact.
Alberto Moreno also endured an erratic season with the club, blowing hot and cold for much of the campaign. When given more offensive responsibilities, he seemed to do well though his defensive frailties were never more brutally exposed than during Manchester United’s 2-1 win at Anfield in March, where he was replaced on 66 minutes.
With a big kitty, there comes the desire to spend it. But that’s where Liverpool need to learn from last summer. Despite the club looking set to rake in an expected £44 million up-front for Raheem Sterling, will three-quarters of that be spent on Christian Benteke or another high-profile striker? That’s very risky. High-profile doesn’t mean high quality. And with Liverpool so flush right now, other teams will drive hard bargains. And that leads to paying more than you should. It happened Liverpool twice last summer as Southampton did superbly well to push them into spending so much on Lallana and Lovren.
Twelve months ago, Rodgers preached about Liverpool signings needing to fit a certain profile but there’s plenty of face-saving going on in such a statement, mainly because the club can only realistically sign certain players. There’s plenty of expectation to show some intent in the transfer market owing to the pending Sterling sale but it’s very difficult for them to do that.
James Milner and Danny Ings are solid acquisitions but their captures certainly haven’t whipped supporters into a state of frenzy. Not that it matters too much. What was the last Liverpool summer deal that did that? Fernando Torres? And therein lies the biggest problem.
Without consistent Champions League football, it’s difficult to lure top names to a club outside the top-four. So, recruitment becomes a deeper and more sensitive issue. Liverpool aren’t competing for those sprinklings of stardust that crop up every once in a while. Manchester United barely scraped qualification to the Champions League yet Memphis Depay was only ever going to Old Trafford, not Anfield. Liverpool couldn’t persuade Alexis Sanchez to choose them over Arsenal.
So, Milner and Ings are good examples of where the club is in terms of its transfer policies. There are the solid, second-tier British players they’ll sign – Lallana, Jordan Henderson, Charlie Adam, Stewart Downing, Andy Carroll. And there are the risks they’ll take – Ballotelli, Suarez, Sturridge. And there are the European players that are well-known to others (but who the others don’t sign) – Moreno, Markovic, Origi, Sakho.
So, Rodgers is right. The big money can only be spent on players that are available, cost a modest amount and who the bigger teams don’t want. And for Liverpool, that’s a small group to choose from. But from that small group, from those quite rigid limitations, it’s imperative that over the next weeks Liverpool get their hands on the best quality that’s available.
It’s inevitable that a number of the players the club signed last year will improve this season. It’s inevitable that the likes of Milner and Clyne will be solid if unspectacular. But Rodgers has little time left for others to float through a transitional period. Many other club executives would’ve sacked him at the end of last term, the three-year project seemingly faltering fast amid a number of well-publicised player departures. But Fenway Sports Group have been supportive. They’ve given him more money to spend and backed his decisions to allow Steven Gerrard leave the club. They’ve also backed him throughout the on-going Sterling soap-opera though that seems a wider attitude taken by the key stakeholders and not just by Rodgers.
But though many will see Sterling’s departure from Liverpool as a blessing, it could well prove a curse for the club’s embattled manager. Because again, Brendan Rodgers has lots of money to spend. And after last year’s chaos, there’s so much pressure on him to spend it correctly this time.
