January Transfer Window

[Tes]

Sturridge medical tomorrow:-

https://twitter.com/Andrew_Heaton/status/282469491923881984

So Rafa's 'rotated' him tomorrow against Villa, so he can have a medical for us. That'll go down well with his detractors at the Bridge. 

[Tes]

Super sub Theo is vastly superior to starter Theo. His pace is lethal against tired legs, and his one trick (kick the ball away + run after it) is easily countered at the beginning of a game. So not to fussed on missing out on Walcott, especially at £80,000 p/w +!

For a support act his goals, assists and chance creation is far better than most at Anfield. He has what we need. Quite a useful combination.

How is Sturridge going to react if he is played in the same position as he was by AVB last season, when he was getting regular starts? It's hard to see Suirez being moved to accomodate him. If Sturridge has the sense required he'll understand that as Luis spends so much time out of the more central areas, he'll get plenty of chance to fill in there. Hope he's not the kind to jump up and down in the dinghy.

[Ed]

Hope he's not the kind to jump up and down in the dinghy.

Is the dinghy in the water or still strapped to the side of the boat?

[Tes]

Is the dinghy in the water or still strapped to the side of the boat?

I guess it depends on your point of view. To be kind to Sturridge as he isn't here yet, you'd have to say strapped to the boat and the boat is still on dry land. 

[the dude abides]

in January, I'd put feelers out to see if there was any interest from other clubs in Allen.  And Borini too could do a job for somebody.

Downing, too little, too late.  Hope someone is interested in him.

And I'd also put feelers out to see if we could offload Sturridge.

I'd hold onto Henderson til the summer at least.

[Tes]

BRENDAN RODGERS HAS BUCKS TO BUY DANIEL STURRIDGE IN £40M SHAKE-UP

By Phil Cadden  Sunday December 23, 2012




BRENDAN RODGERS will be handed £40million by his board as he prepares to overhaul his Liverpool team.

The Reds boss has convinced owners Fenway Sports Group he needs big money for the task.

And after being impressed with Rodgers’ management skills in a testing six months in charge, the Americans are ready to open the cheque book. First through the door will be Chelsea striker Daniel Sturridge in a £12m deal that should be tied up in the first week in January when the transfer window opens.

And he will be followed into Anfield by Blackpool’s Thomas Ince as Rodgers attempts to bring back the 20-year-old let go for a pittance by Kenny Dalglish 18 months ago.

Including wages and the rise handed to 18-year-old winger Raheem Sterling this week – said to be from £2,000 to £40,000 a week – those deals will eat up nearly two thirds of the budget.

But there will still be enough left for Rodgers to swoop for Birmingham’s goalkeeper Jack Butland.

The youngster has already played for England, and the Kop boss sees him a perfect replacement for Pepe Reina, who is now 30.

And the rest of the cash will be splashed out on snapping up French defender Nicolas Isimat Mirin. The stopper, 21, is available for a cut-price fee as he only has 18 months remaining on his deal at French Ligue 1 club Valenciennes.

Rodgers could raise more money if he can offload players but there have been few takers for the likes of former Aston Villa winger Stewart Downing and ex-Sunderland midfielder Jordan Henderson.

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/366714

Ince I wouldn't consider if Blackpool, or rather that @hole Karl Oyston, want more than £4M and again that's the highest end of high.

Dalglish could have done worse than give a chance to Ince, Sterling, Suso etc first rather than splash on who he did, either that or simply upgrade one or two from his caretaker role and then 'steady as she goes' and carry on exactly the same as he had been doing in the previous half a season. Unfortunately the seed had been sown and the style dictated due to the stupid purchase of Carroll.

The purchase of another central defender either hints at doubts over Coates or is Carragher's replacement (who's out of contract in the Summer). It doesn't suggest that he sees Kelly as a centre back, or rates Wisdom as one, at least not yet. Wilson looks to be out the door if this buy goes ahead.

I would though prefer he brought in cover for Lucas ahead of a central defender, because as the last two seasons have proven, a defensive midfielder is crucial, especially with goal scoring being a problem, and that won't be completely solved this window, as we need two strikers (one on the pitch and one on the bench for when Luis is unavailable) and arguably replacements for Kuyt, Maxi and Bellamy, so that Sterling can be brought along and nurtured carefully and sensibly and not overplayed.
Where Borini truly fits into the equation is hard to tell, but I don't see him playing as a wide forward in the same way as you can see Sturridge, Walcott, Sterling or even Suarez.

If we sign Ince, we will then have two youngsters needing careful handling (despite what Ince might think), and the debateful Downing and Assaidi as our wide forwards, with Sturridge having to double up in both central and wide positions, and then Luis and Borini centrally.
Depending on how Sturridge fits in and performs we have 2 'senior' strikers, 1 youngster centrally, 2 youngsters wide and 2 further debatables wide.

Still not the strength and scoring solutions required, better than now but still further 'first choice' strengthening needed in the Summer to even think about thinking about challenging for the Top Four.

Butland hasn't been as strong this season as last so far from everything I've read of him, and it might prove to be a 'Carson'. Not sure he's at the stage of being a certain top class keeper but despite that Brum would still want 'big money' for him as there's a sniff of potential there. 

[the dude abides]

if true, the yanks are mad to allow this guy another 40 million to squander.

buying back the kid ince, for an inflated fee, is madness.

we have no need  for another keeper, farless Jack Butland (as Tes says, it has the hallmarks of another Carson signing)

and the signing of Sturridge is pure undiluted madness.

I think there should be a vote of no confidence taken against the owners.

[Tes]

JOE COLE SET TO BE QPR FIRST JANUARY SIGNING

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/366170/Joe-Cole-set-to-be-QPR-first-January-signing

"Liverpool midfielder Joe Cole is set to be Queens Park Rangers’ first signing of the January transfer window if they can agree a deal with the Anfield club on his wages. "

So we're going to pay them so Joe Cole can play first team football - what's wrong with Joe Cole showing the desire for such by acceptin what QPR offer him (within reason), without it including us?

[Tes]

Seems like the Ince deal is off according to quite a few rumours?

Edward, what's the score as far as you've heard?


If that's the case and rather than spend on Butland, we ought to spend the combined cash on Honda. As hasbeen discussed before, not only would his creativity and goals be a huge boost to us - a Suarez/Honda axis would be terrific, we'd also benefit massively from his popularity in the Far East.   

[the dude abides]

heard stories of us having to pay Cole 3.5 million to leave.

I hope we can find buyers for Allen, Borini, Carroll, Downing and Sturridge.

[Tes]

heard stories of us having to pay Cole 3.5 million to leave.

That perfectly sums up our recent transfer business. Pay to sell. Even the seller fees on Ebay/Paypal wouldn't amount to that much.

[the dude abides]

That perfectly sums up our recent transfer business. Pay to sell. Even the seller fees on Ebay/Paypal wouldn't amount to that much.

 

wouldn;t it be a great idea if our Dunce-ball owners recruited players on average contracts, with great incentive bonuses, linked to performance and success in competitions.

[Tes]

wouldn;t it be a great idea if our Dunce-ball owners recruited players on average contracts, with great incentive bonuses, linked to performance and success in competitions.

It would be the most assured way of slashing the wage bill. The bonus payments column would be very empty.

What is worrying is that halfway through the season we've not really improved overall on the goalscoring front, and the defensive side shows no consistant sign of improvement. Game 1 concede 3 goals away to WBA, game 19 concede 3 goals away to Stoke City. If we were talking about Arsenal or either of the Manc teams, or at a stretch, Spurs, where we never seem to do well, then I'd say there were some sort of mitigating reason, but Stoke. The same Stoke who are hardly known for their goal scoring prowess, and 3 at home to Villa, who have been absolutely awfully all season and seem to have got even worse since beating us. That should have been a confidence boost, a point to build from, but in keeping with how they've been the rest of the season they've just been awful since.

With our lack of strikers come Sept 1, surely we needed to adapt and play in a way that made the most of both our wide forwards, ie them getting in the box whenever the ball is in a crossing position, or pushing up as a team so the midfielders could be brought into play more and enabling at least one to add to the numbers in the box.

It's curious that not only do we lack any sort of numbers in the box when the ball gets played in, but also lack cover for the defence when our possession breaks down. It seems that too many players are out of the required position(s) for so much of the play, whichever end it's at. 

It's either that the philosophy is proving to be wrong, the instigation of it is being done wrongly or that the change is being made too fast meaning we've removed our defensive strength (which could have contributed towards previous scoring deficiencies) without moving towards increased goalscoring, which at least would have helped offset being less strong defensively.

[the dude abides]

It would be the most assured way of slashing the wage bill. The bonus payments column would be very empty.

What is worrying is that halfway through the season we've not really improved overall on the goalscoring front, and the defensive side shows no consistant sign of improvement. Game 1 concede 3 goals away to WBA, game 19 concede 3 goals away to Stoke City. If we were talking about Arsenal or either of the Manc teams, or at a stretch, Spurs, where we never seem to do well, then I'd say there were some sort of mitigating reason, but Stoke. The same Stoke who are hardly known for their goal scoring prowess, and 3 at home to Villa, who have been absolutely awfully all season and seem to have got even worse since beating us. That should have been a confidence boost, a point to build from, but in keeping with how they've been the rest of the season they've just been awful since.

With our lack of strikers come Sept 1, surely we needed to adapt and play in a way that made the most of both our wide forwards, ie them getting in the box whenever the ball is in a crossing position, or pushing up as a team so the midfielders could be brought into play more and enabling at least one to add to the numbers in the box.

It's curious that not only do we lack any sort of numbers in the box when the ball gets played in, but also lack cover for the defence when our possession breaks down. It seems that too many players are out of the required position(s) for so much of the play, whichever end it's at. 

It's either that the philosophy is proving to be wrong, the instigation of it is being done wrongly or that the change is being made too fast meaning we've removed our defensive strength (which could have contributed towards previous scoring deficiencies) without moving towards increased goalscoring, which at least would have helped offset being less strong defensively.

the philosophy is wrong, Tes.

why haven't other clubs thought of this great strategy, of playing a passing style, like Barcelona.   The truth is, Barcelona have top-notch technical players, that other clubs can only dream about.

so, that was the first reaon, why it would never work at anfield.

the second reason (and if they had asked, Rafa could have given rodgers and our owners advice and warnings about this) is that that passing style does not work well in english football.  You HAVE to be able to fight and graft in this league.  Wenger has found that out at Arsenal.  Sweet passing football, and lots of triangles, will only get you so far.

But our owners, and Ayres, knew better, and were sweet-talked by Rodger's bu.lls.hit and 180 page dossier about how the game should be played.

Rodgers philosophy is that of a very inexperienced man.  Any top senior manager would pick a  thousand holes in it.  But hey, our owners knew better.

[barticus]

I see some speculation that Rafa might buy Negredo (tried and tested Spanish International with a good strike rate) from Seville for 14 mil....12 mil of the money being ours when we buy Sturridge....2 managers buying 2 strikers for a similar amount of money...i know which one i'd prefer..