A note on Liverpool

£125m for a player that always gets hurt? Another £85m for a player in the exact same position, without a clear view towards a partnership? Another £115m for an endemic 10? Wild. But sacking Arne Slot was bold, and correct. 

The Dutchman’s refusal to accept responsibility for the team’s poor performances and strange tirades about the “type of football we want to see,” fell flat in pathetic, irresponsible performances against PSG and rang hypocritical in stodgy, pragmatic performances against Arsenal. If the likes of Mohamaed Salah’s posts are any indication, he clearly lost the locker room as well. 

Bringing in Andoni Iraola is a game-changing appointment that’s a perfect match for the demands in the Premier League, as well as what The Kop demands from its team—high intensity pressing, bodies bombing forward, and the skill to punish. 

When surrounded with competent, not great, just competent defenders, Virgil van Dijk is still an elite orchestrator. Like his protege William Saliba, he is a defender of space, capable of covering large areas defensively and effectively squeezing the opposition inside their own half. He also has the technical quality to retain possession and progress play after winning the ball. Ibrahima Konate, like Gabriel, is a defender of the man, a far easier skillset to replace.  

Konate was never as good or as bad as purported. He is decent on the ball and when fit can effectively get about the pitch. This past season his form dipped and calamitous errors became commonplace. That is not the sum truth of his abilities. 

While his departure is not a huge loss for Liverpool, it is embarrassing to see yet another big-minute player leave for free. I would be surprised to see him start at Real Madrid, but the lack of dynamic attackers in La Liga could make him an athletic outlier, at least for the next season or two. 

Giovanni Leoni and Jeremy Jacquet are Blue-Chip prospects, with the Frenchman the more capable of playing serious minutes at the moment. Iraola has shown great skill in developing CBs—Huijsen, Zabarnyi, Senesi, Hill—and both these young men have the size and skill to be important figures at the heart of a defense. 

Milos Kerkez is an average LB, but the introduction of Iraola will provide a familiarity tactically that he seemed to lack under Slot. The Hungarian is athletic, and has shown an ability to play up to the occasion, but he needs to see the game more quickly in possession. 

If Kerkez can get a clearer picture of his intended action before receiving the ball, his fast-twitch attributes will be more positively expressed. This means fewer touches on the ball in the defensive and middle thirds and more dynamic running and first-time crosses down the left side. Simply put: he needs to do more of what he’s good at and less of what he’s not. 

Jeremie Frimpong is a remarkably poor defender, but a flyer on the overlap with rare quality in the final third for a RB. Iraola’s system will give him much higher-highs next season, though the lows won’t abandon him. It’s important Liverpool invest in alternatives to both young full-backs. 

Joe Gomez is still a very decent player, and his theoretical ability to cover at RB as well as CB is valuable. Unfortunately, he is so rarely fit. Selling him makes sense, but when the fee Liverpool are likely to receive is considered—less than £15m—it could be worthwhile to hold onto him another season, especially when the necessary and considerable outlays on other positions are taken into account. This does leave depth at CB a bit light on reliable fitness as well as experience. 

Conor Bradley is not a Champions League level player. He possesses great athleticism, but his technical ability is lacking, as is his emotional stability on the pitch. His ACL tear could make a deal difficult to do, but a loan with an obligation to buy around £15-20m would be good business on Liverpool’s part. Frimpong requires a sturdy alternative. 

Andy Robertson has been Liverpool’s best LB in the Premier League era, though the competition for such a moniker is surprisingly thin… Jose Enrique or Jon Flanagan anyone? A little Alberto Moreno or Konstantinos Tsimikas in your life? I suppose Jon Arne Riise was OK. 

Anyways, it’s time to move on (because you can’t sell Kerkez) and with a move to Tottenham sealed, he can be congratulated for his excellent spell at Liverpool and commended for his bravery in daring to do, or whatever it is that the Spurs claim these days. 

Despite uncharacteristic lapses in concentration this past season, Alisson is still a top-level GK and a worthy #1 for a team with title ambitions. 

Giorgi Mamardashvili, on the other hand, looks like a Georgian Donnarumma and plays like an unathletic one. He struggles to track long-range shots and is constantly asking the referees to bail him out on set-pieces. He’s also quite cumbersome on the ball. If Liverpool can move him on before his market value plummets they ought to. Considering him an heir to Alisson, or even capable of displacing him in the coming season, is foolish. Armin Pesci is a talented young GK that could benefit from a season of tutelage under Alisson. 

Liverpool have a few clear, top-level options in midfield. 

Ryan Gravenberch is an excellent Box-to-Box, Ball-Carrying CM, though there are still small deficiencies in his game, particularly in the accuracy and weight of pass at short/medium lengths.

Curtis Jones is a swiss army knife and very similar in style to Alexis MacAllister. 

Dominik Szoboszlai is the star of the show, with special dead-ball abilities and the running power to dominate physically in any zone. 

Florian Wirtz is where things get interesting. 

The issue with the German lies in his specificity—he requires too many conditions to provide the best version of himself, and that is not the essence of a £100m+ footballer. 

Moreover, we may see him struggle to acclimatize to Iraola’s high-intensity press while maintaining composure on the ball. He is likely to lack fitness/dynamism after a full Premier League season and World Cup to finish attacking moves in the box if playing centrally. It’s hard to see Iraola preferring him to Dominik Szoboszlai in such a role anyways. There are additional questions about whether he has the pace and power to beat Premier League full-backs down the outside. 

A comparable player, Rayan Cherki, has taken to the Prem quickly because he is far more applicable across styles and contexts—fast twitch, elite with both feet, comfortable receiving the ball in the defensive third. He cost less than £40m. 

So why is Morgan Rogers worth near £100m, you may ask? Look at him compared to Wirtz. Literally, side-by-side, look at them. One is 6’2, 180 pounds. The other is 5’8, 150. One can play CM, 10, LW/RW, and SS. One can only cut it in the league playing as a Wide-Left 10 with a LWB and at least two Box-To-Box midfielders behind him. Oh, and don’t forget the Target Man #9 with pace in behind + RF, too. Do me a favor! There’s no skill argument, either. Rogers blows Wirtz out of the water in any sort of “street ball” metric. 

Florian Wirtz is a talented player and a legitimate creative force in tight spaces. He has almost no backlift to his shooting motion and displays great technical empathy, which is why he has so much success combining with others in the final third. But his abilities, rather, his deficiencies, make him poorly suited to the Premier League, and the presence of Szoboszlai makes him only a rotational option in an advanced midfield role under Iraola. In England, he is simply Fabio Vieira with better press. 

While a partner in midfield for Gravenberch does need to be brought in, Liverpool fans need a reality check about selling Alexis MacAllister. 

First, it would be a case of selling at the nadir of a player’s relative value. He is barely removed from being known as a classy, World Cup/Premier League Winning CM featured almost ubiquitously in teams of the season. This past year, he struggled to get around the pitch at times, and the Liverpool faithful are ready to throw him on the scrap heap.  

Under Iraola, it might be hard to imagine how things might improve at first, but consider the success of a player like Tyler Adams at Bournemouth as a deep-lying playmaker and ask if yourself if you don’t think Alexis MacAllister could play that role to greater effect. 

For a player of such high quality, that seems like the more congruent solution with the respect to the ambitions Liverpool will have next season. The only reason to reconsider wold be if Arsenal pass on the chance of signing Adam Wharton. 

Endo is similar to Cristian Norgaard—fine, but mostly a passenger on an elite side. The importance of high-character players in a team is not something to brush aside, but Liverpool are in a moment where they need to substantially raise the quality of the floor of their squad, and he is an obvious point of improvement. 

Andoni Irola may want an additional 10 in the side with the capability of playing out wide, as well. 

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In Alexander Isak and Hugo Ekitike, Liverpool boast the most fearsome duo of CFs in Europe, though Isak has always struggled to play more than 70% of a Premier League season, and Ekitike is out until at least January with a ruptured achilles. This leaves them vulnerable, and explains rumours surrounding the potential return of Darwin Nunez on a free transfer. 

Cody Gakpo is a strange player to watch. From an opposition POV, he always seems to cause danger and rarely has trouble creating space for a shot or cross. Conversely, he seems to rarely hit the target, and for a man standing at 6’3, he is bad in the air. 

Were a club to come in with a hefty bid, Liverpool should consider it, but with so many potential outgoings and fitness struggles across the frontline, letting him go could prove short-sighted. Better to shift him into a less crucial role within the team. 

While Victor Munoz is a good, cost-effective (£35m) signing, capable of operating off both wings, it does call into question the pursuit of Yan Diomande, who may now cost more than £100m. Liverpool still certainly need a pure RW to replace the legendary Mohamed Salah, who by the way, is still a very good player. 

Bringing him back for another season, now that Slot is gone, shouldn’t be totally off-the-table for Liverpool. It would allow them to invest more thoroughly in other positions of need, and it’s not like this past season was any sort of send-off. He was taking shots at Slot from the bench all season and the team was in understandably poor spirits. Give it one more year on a slightly reduced contract and do it properly. 

Yes, I’m aware this is nearly impossible. But he hasn’t agreed to sign anywhere else yet, and there’s little flying around the rumor mill concretely about where he may head next. 

Rio Ngumoha is a Callum Hudson-Odoi regen, and a very exciting talent off the left. But don’t over-egg him yet. We’re not talking about a Max Dowman level talent, or really even an Ethan Nwaneri level talent. 

Federico Chiesa is a bull-dog with game changing pace, like a less skilled Martinelli. Regular minutes will continue to be difficult to come by, and a move to Italy could help re-ignite his career. 

Suggested Action: 

Sell—Mamardashvili, Konate, Robertson, Bradley, Endo, Bajcetic, Chiesa, Salah

Target—

RB: Kayode, Livramento, G.Read, G.Doue

LB: Grimaldo, Dimarco, Balde, Diouf

CM: Joao Simoes, A.Scott, Manzambi, M.Fernandes 

R10: H.Wilson, B.Diaz, Nwaneri, Akliouche

RW: Rayan, Y.Diomande, B.Toure, Adeyemi

What It Could Look Like: