31 Dec 2022 12:08:12
Window hasn’t opened yet and we’ve signed a forward but there is conflicting messages from different journalists.

Paul Joyce (arguably the most reliable) says a new midfielder is unlikely unless an ‘unexpected opportunity arises’, however other journos have said literally a few days ago that Liverpool haven’t ruled out any new signings meaning there is a possibility.

Klopps comments are also confusing, himself not ruling out new signings saying that they know what they want to do and will see if they can do it, only for 2 days later for him to talk about collecting money to be able to spend it.

Ed002 are you aware of Liverpool still looking for a midfielder for January or is business done for the window already (even though it hasn’t already opened) . The midfield issue just seems so glaringly obvious that I can’t believe anyone at LFC believes it shouldn’t be an area to strengthen in the January window.

Thanks!

{Ed002's Note - As I have said if the opportuinity arises for Liverpool to sign one of the midfield players they have an interest in at an acceptable fee.}

1.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 12:21:19
Understood. Seems as fair of a response as ever.

Hopefully they get something over the line.

Have a good new year and thanks for providing us info over the year!

2.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 12:43:38
? now you all know how I felt in Summer when we didn’t sign a Midfielder.
I’ve gone beyond the disbelief for me now and its predictable almost laughable tbh. I just watch teams Run over us game after game waiting for Jan.
The way Trent and Robbo are exposed because the midfield cover can’t keep up with the game.
The way we’ve had to abandon the press because the midfielders are Shot.
The way we have Go long ball 9 times out of 10 because the midfield can’t create anymore.
The way the defence has lost all confidence because the midfield is invisible.

It’s not enjoyable to watch our team at the minute. And yet it’s such an easy fix.
I don’t think we need to spend the kind of money we sometimes think, it’s a case of getting in 2 midfielders that can Run and don’t get injured all the time. We’d improve instantly.

3.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 12:59:21
All part of the usual LFC transfer playbook.

4.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 13:05:09
Agree LiverpoolFC8. It’s awful to watch us at the moment. And what’s worse, these are voluntary decisions made by Klopp et al.

5.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 13:46:02
Yep. Managers fault. Amazing out of every midfielder across the whole world that there's only 1 that allegedly improves us.

6.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 14:02:45
If we don’t get a midfielder we’ll finish 6th or below and go out of the CL and fa cup. Thiago will get injured at some stage and we haven’t got another 8 who’s any good. Henderson, Milner, Ox, Keita, Jones, Elliott none of them start for City, United, Arsenal, Spurs, Chelsea, Newcastle, Leicester, Brighton, West Ham. We need 1 to keep us going then another 2 in the summer.

7.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 14:17:30
OneKiss,

FSG must protect their investment at all costs, plus the increased squad value will be taken into consideration when the club is sold, so it is a no loose situation, unless they do not buy an energetic MF, and we continue to play as we have been.

8.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 15:55:10
Surely the way to counteract this situation is for us to drop deep, be compact and engage them in our half. Then quick counter, we have the players perfect for it. This high without pressure is suicide.

9.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 16:14:25
There needs to be a world class midfielder available for 20m who’s for sale for us to act. I actually think it would be impressive if we managed to find a midfielder who didn’t improve us.

10.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 16:18:27
I see transfer fever is ramping up nicely prior to the window opening.
I look forward to the handwringing, knicker wetting, proclamations of doom and demise when we don't sign the latest flavour of the month which eventually will cause an emotional breakdown for a few.
Don't forget it's New Year, find time to enjoy yourselves and celebrate while carrying that heavy yoke of depression.

11.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 17:04:19
OP - all the different reports you’ve read are different ways of saying what ed2 has been saying.

12.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 18:05:00
Klopp’s Achilles heel is loyalty. It’s a disgrace the midfield hasn’t been improved and I do blame him for that. When you’ve got a clearly visible issue and do nothing you deserve the criticism that comes your way.

13.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 18:50:50
In terms of quality no one can argue in the summer or now that we need new blood in midfield.

But, in terms of quanity I didn't see how we added to it.

Thiago, Henderson, fab, keita, Jones ox milner elliot and then the young ones. I have probably forgot one or two too.

We needed to make space in the summer, but for injury prone or aging players the list of buyers were small. So we made a choice to stick and refresh this year and put a plaster over the problem with Arthur.

14.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 18:56:11
Hessle. How are you so sure its klopp being too loyal to the players? What if its our guys who run the club that tells him that he has to work with what he has? That he has 20m+ sales every year to work with and that's it.

15.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 19:21:55
Didn’t he just spend £64m and the rest on Nunez?

16.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 19:49:41
The guys who run the club tell Klopp to work with what he has? Well, yeah and so he should. if Klopp was telling the truth that it was his decision to not pursue an alternative to Tchouameni then yeah he should work with what he has and let the recruitment team do their job.

17.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 20:17:36
‘It’s a disgrace’, get a life mate.

18.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 20:19:32
He did but we had to get another forward in with mane, origi and minimino leaving. Our net spend last summer if u take away the add ons on mane+nunez deals was roughly 8m. man utds was 202m and they didn't qualify for champ league. I think people mistake klopps backing of players in public as loyalty but what else can he say in public about the players? He can hardly say ox and keita crap! Summer of 2021 we needed to go big in transfer market and also needed to get rid of few players, take hit on them and get on with it. Arsenal did it and also did it last summer and fair play to them it's worked. Anyway that's only my opinion on it.

19.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 21:51:54
If you take the last four PL matches we are joint top of the League with Arsenal with 4 wins from 4, city have lost one and drawn one of their last four. Obviously you can prove anything with stats and I’m probably borrowing from VVVV’s supply of false equivalency, but to judge by the response of posters you’d think we were about to be relegated.

What’s becoming tedious is the idea that certain posters have that we need to buy midfielders. Even the simplest amongst us who don’t understand football tactics in the slightest (like me) understand that people think the midfield needs refreshing. People who write the same thing over and over again and again and again and again expecting it to make a difference are either delusional or stupid.

Over the past two windows and leading up to the start of this one LFC have spent (or committed to spending) in excess of £ 150m and people still say that the club won’t spend money or that the club can’t afford to buy a midfielder without ever considering that the midfielder or midfielders that the CLUB want ( and not the people who say the same thing over and over and over and over again every day ) are not available and that wasting money on players the CLUB don’t actually want or need might actually put us in a ‘worse’ position than we are now.

I see we are now playing the ‘Klopp is too loyal’ card which is really funny when you actually think about what the club has been doing for the last two or three years - Ramsey, Konate, Tsimikas, Elliot, Carvalho, Diaz, Nunez, Gakpo and bringing trough the likes of Kelleher, Morton, Bradley, Bajcetic, Frauendorf etc, etc. if you can’t see the club is going through a transitional period and is targeting players ( and those with potential ) that will be a fit for what we are transitioning to then I just we’ll just have to carry on with the same old song for the next 12 - 18 months.

Anyway, enough, what does everybody think we should do with the midfield?

20.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 23:04:34
WDW, I applaud your sentiments and pretty much of what you have written. Bravo

Happy new year everyone!,

21.) 31 Dec 2022
31 Dec 2022 23:07:35
WDW - we don’t need to spend 100s of millions but we do, as a result of poor planning, need as many as 3 midfielders. If we are dressing up this season as “transition” rather than “disaster”, then we entered transition when it was not really required. We’ve had 3 windows to refresh midfield with a 4th opening tomorrow.

I’m a fan of Klopp’s loyalty. It’s his super power. However it is also his kryptonite in the case of putting too much faith in players that should have been shipped out. I also think he’s got a major problem brewing with his no2 - but we’ll see if that’s a fair accusation in time.

Happy new year!

22.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 00:23:59
Is Klopp loyal? Apparently he flew all the way to Monaco to meet with Tchouameni. That doesn’t sound too loyal to the midfielders he was hoping to replaced

I agree with WDW and the other thing that becomes tedious is the constant use of the midfield for every perceived poor performance.

23.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 00:48:30
Let’s be honest, we have been VERY lucky to have won the last couple of games…. our midfield literally is non-existent and offers no cover to our defenders who are shaky enough as it is. A good example is the game against Leicester…. they have plenty of opportunities and could have they had better finishers they could have easily beaten us. Same as the game before that, the opposition has plenty of clear cut chances and had they had better finishers, they could easily have won! I hope we bring in a midfielder because the ones we have aren’t good enough anymore, no disrespect to Henderson, Thiago and Fabinho, but these players are past their best, and I just think that Elliott still isn’t good enough yet (too lightweight and and loses the ball easily) . I’d rather have carvalho play as an attacking mid as I think he has more to offer than Elliott.

24.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 01:43:35
Is this not the midfield that nearly took us to four trophies, its not that bad let's face it. I think Konate is massive for us when he plays, as a team we play a lot better. I would start him ahead of Matip.

25.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 02:17:31
We’ve been still the better team, just not up to our usual very high standards. Still deserved to win the last two games. City were the better team in the league cup game and deserved to win, we still pushed them for the whole game though.

Liverpool need to improve, I don’t think anyone would disagree with that. One or two players will make a massive difference though.

26.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 03:18:48
I really hate the Klopp-bashing at the slightest thing. Loyalty!? Klopp's loyalty is a problem? Not the lack of investment, not the missed opportunities (Tchouameni), not the injuries, not the lack of progression from certain young (ish) players, no no. Klopp's "loyalty" is the problem. Are you real fans, or just fickle glory supporters? The man has worked wonders, do not forget.

27.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 04:10:30
Ok everyone, it's a new year. Time to be positive!

Last year we were within 15 minutes of a domestic treble, etc etc etc.

Although it is obvious now that we need to revamp midfield, it WASN'T OBVIOUS THEN.

FSG are trying to sell the club, and Klopp is a modern-day genius. Whining about them is insane - new investment will come in, players will be bought, and we will go again.

28.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 04:10:34
In the Leicester game we had 21 shots to their 7, 5 on target to their 2 but apparently we were lucky because they didn’t have better finishers, what sort of joke analysis is that? We weren’t very good but we were still the better team over the whole 90 minutes and if we had finished better we’d have scored a hatful.

29.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 04:17:47
WDW great post but I'm w Pelican here. Transition or evolve? I would argue the two are mutually inclusive: we can transition and also evolve at the same time, as City do season after season. 150m spent in 2 transfer windows you say, but let's compare that to the net spend of the 5-6 teams around us. If we are to stay at the top then we have to compete in the market and, for me, we are not doing that. I love the model that we've achieved so much success with, but without Klopp we wouldn't have done what we've done. I hate what's happened to our sport with the money and I know that Klopp does too. But if we're going to continue our success and competing year in year out, we have to invest more into the squad. We have some wonderful young players coming through as you point out, but to compare the likes of City they combine youth w spending big in the market. The other top clubs (Arsenal come to mind here) are doing the same. But right now we have an aging and or injury prone midfield that are costing us on the pitch. We need fresh blood. I'll close by applauding the club for signing Gapko when we have the injuries we do. There may be more in play w this signing than meets the eye (Diaz coming in last year for Mane leaving for example) but right now I'd say our midfield is more in need of investment than our front line. Thiago is an absolute must in our mid but i don't think anyone thinks he'll see out the season without missing a run of matches. We don't pick up a mid this month we'll finish 6th or 7th.

30.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 05:23:43
Can I just say - in the real world where things actually happen and you can’t do the same thing over and over again, like you can on you laptop / tablet / electrical device of your choice until you finally manage to stumble on a solution that works - it doesn’t matter if we were lucky to win the last two games or not. In 10, 20, 40 years, whenever, the records books will say we won the two matches and to use ‘luck’ as a tool to beat up the club, team, midfield, whatever is nonsense.

@FlyPelicanFly, explain what you mean by ‘disaster’ please. are you talking about the ongoing war in the Ukraine or the removal of female rights by the Taliban in Afghanistan or the subjugation of human tights around the world in general or are you talking about your opinion that we should have signed two ot three midfielders for a football team.

Grow up and get a sense of perspective and appreciate that the club is working to its own plan - not yours or mine - and let’s see what you think about Morton, Bajcetic, Clark, Elliot, Carvalho, Gordon, Doak, Kone-Doherty etc. Who knows maybe the club are looking at promoting from within and trusting their Academy system to save a couple of bob or two although, like you, I have no idea what their plans are.

One final thing I would say is that in the past 3 or 4 years that this disaster has been brewing we have some how stumbled to winning the PL and CL and World Club Championship - are there any ther English clubs that have done that?

31.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 06:03:56
WDW - no not like the disasters I see in my day job whereby lives are lost everyday and families and livelihoods destroyed.

As this is a footy forum about LFC I meant the season has been a mess created by the club staff rather than some planned transition.

Happy new year.

32.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 07:17:55
We’ve matched city every step of the way the last 4 seasons. We’ve both had an off year in that time.
The disasterfication on here just shows the small club never going to win again mentality that some fans here have. It’s really sad.

33.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 08:28:53
I agree we're starting to sound like a bunch of bitter blue noses.

34.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 10:33:28
Ed002-
"acceptable fee" - unfortunately that phrase no longer exists in today's football world.

{Ed002's Note - You may well be right Yuri.}

35.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 10:40:36
You'd think that people who deal with disasters every day would have some sense of perspective. Maybe constantly predicting the portents of doom on here is a coping mechanism?
The comparison to bitter blue noses is a fair one, albeit rather sad.
It's like an obsessive ritual to post the same over dramatic stuff on here several times a day like the club is on the verge of going out of business.
If people want to see a badly run club that gets it wrong all the time look across the park. This club is the polar opposite of that, but you'd think it was us on the verge of relegation reading some of the tripe that gets posted on here.

And a Happy New Year to all!

36.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 12:10:02
I shall whine about the midfield no longer. Nor shall I whine about the tactics employed or system deployed. I shall no longer point out that despite the nearly quad we stopped pressing last season. I shall also not suggest that this is an unforced transition. And lastly, I shall no longer question what we do in training.

Perhaps if Ed says it, it won’t sound like obsessive doom mongering short-termism.

37.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 13:55:53
A list of youngsters that various posters trot out year after year is very unlikely to solve our issues. The likelihood is one at most will make it at Liverpool. Transition won’t matter if we don’t make top four. We will find it increasingly difficult to get back to the top if we miss out. Klopp takes all the plaudits when we were winning trophies and now he should take the criticism for leaving us with a bottom half midfield.

38.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 13:57:34
By the sound of things FPF you can't see the club doing a single thing right. By your description the club is falling apart at the seams.
Have you got us confused with Everton?
Take a day off and look for the positives mate, and if you start to think this club is going to rack and ruin just look across the park.
That's yer perspective right there.

39.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 14:16:27
FlashTheRed - I haven’t said the club is falling apart. Show me where I have said that.

PS forgive me for not supporting the club with my “glad we’re not Everton” scarf tied tightly around my neck.

40.) 01 Jan 2023
01 Jan 2023 15:07:59
I like all the criticism on our midfield, for they are all correct.
It is a shocking collections of players.
Keita, shockingly bad even when fit, which is a rarity in itself. He runs probably at the same pace as milner.
AOC, always like a headless chicken, wherever he plays.
Elliot, full marks on effort and desire, but just not there, at least not yet.
Henderson, a shadow of himself.
Fabinho, not the solution. Although I have to say, if we looked at the midfield in its entirety, maybe it is just that his weakness, ie mainly speed, is simply exposed.
Thiago, when fit, is probably a good enough player.

And none of them will get into Man City.
Wanted to say top 6, but the midfields of the other top teams probably has weaker player where Thiago or Fabinho can make sense.

Poor.

Where is Gerrard? Or Alonso?
Both of them even now, may outshine our current lot. lol.