12 Apr 2021 18:21:39
Here is a stat. Since mo salah signed for us he has been available gor 185 out of 190 games. 2 games not available due to C.V. and two games due to concussion.
I think the numbers for mane and bobby are also over 90% Availability.
That is some amazing fitness. I see all these posts mane is done, bobby is done, sell salah. They are 30 getting old.
No one replaces their numbers form is temporary fitness is permanent because work ethic is ingrained in them. They can all play well into 30s because they work on their fitness.
Id say wait out this crazy C.V. period and hold on to these class players. We are simply not going to replace them with jota or whoever you think we can. They still have two solid years in them if not more.
There is no right time to sell your best players.

12 Apr 2021 19:15:36
OP, I fully agree with you and to support your points on the fitness levels of these three players, I will mention a couple of things.

Firstly, recruitment is key here cos we know that our scouting dept don’t just check on the ability of the prospect to play football but we check on the players’ injury history and clearly, they must have had a good idea of how fit our three is based on their availability for games at their previous clubs.

Secondly, investment from FSG. Many of us think investment just means signing players and all that or expanding the stadium and upgrading infrastructure. I then, watched a podcast on LFC and how the owners have invested on something I did not even think about prior: Medical facilities.

In order to have your best players available most of the time, you have to have not just the best training facilities BUT also, the best medical facilities and FSG have reportedly invested in the medical infrastructure and the Sports Science dept. IMO, these are just as important as signing players cos if you can have the front three perform as well as they have in a crazy workload, same as VVD has as well cos his availability was thru the roof before his injury.

Now does this mean the front three is finished? I think Salah and Bobbie still have stuff left in the tank if their workload is managed properly but Mane is my concern cos he needs a real vacation cos his legs are gone, IMO. We shall see.

12 Apr 2021 19:48:57
Oli if you have a bad patch things don't stick and you can't run. Mane will come back. He acknowledged he is having problems this season and understood he needs to score more.

Has this season been a mess. Yes but it not all to blame on mane or bobby. Its a team game a lot of players are injured and a lot have underperformed but i don't want to sell our best players and say we are moving forward selling mane is two steps back. Id say keep your best three and let elliot and jota learn day in day out from them play with them challenge them.

12 Apr 2021 20:01:49
Olired, you write some tripe.

{Ed077's Note - ???

12 Apr 2021 20:27:02
Fitness isn’t permanent. Once I hit 30 everything started to bloody break and fall off and it takes a million years to heal.
But to be serious, I don’t think anyone doubts our front 3 have a good few miles left in the tank but times ticking if we are ever going to get decent money for them to reinvest in the next generation of talent.
Sure they can retire here and we will have a few more years of joy but then we will be skint and looking to replace them and that will be difficult without money.
Let their legs go somewhere else I say. Apart from Firmino, I would keep him because his game doesn’t rely on pace and the likes of Minimino (if he stays) and Elliot can learn a lot from him. Plus Salah and Mane are the ones who are going to get the money in.

12 Apr 2021 20:45:17
Akira. Those are all great stats and of course they have been great servants for the club. We also have to remember that we are not Man City and flush we cash. We have a ready made replacement in Jota for Mane. Mane’s form is concerning if we really dig into it but that’s a wider discussion to be had. He will be 30 years of age by this time next summer and will have 1 year left on his contract. To leave it until then would be poor future planning plus it has been said his head might have already been turned. We don’t want to conduct ourselves like Arsenal and have a situation where we have players leaving for free or with next to no resale value.

Again, we also don’t want to carry out the rebuild of our front three all at once. Salah’s numbers don’t lie and we don’t have a ready made replacement for him. I wouldn’t replace him first unless we can get Haaland, Mbappe or Martínez and they are all unattainable and a pipe dream so he would be next summer and not this summer. Firmino’s form has been as bad as Mane but we don’t have a ready made replacement for him and he certainly wouldn’t fetch as much as Mane would. I love all three for what they have achieved and done for the club but we have got to realise nothing last forever, players come and go and we need to plan for the next phase in our club when it comes to the team and squad.

12 Apr 2021 21:02:37
Surely by now the medical staff and the coaches will know if this is a temporary blip for Mane or the start of a serious decline. A lot will depend on the fitness issue but also will any club pay £80m plus?

12 Apr 2021 21:18:17
Akira, when I say it seems Mane’s legs are gone, I meant for right now and not that they have gone for good cos clearly, I have no way of knowing that as only time will tell.

I like you am also of the opinion that we should not be selling our front three in a hasty fashion esp if they have the desire to stay and prove that they still have something to offer. We should be getting players on to lighten their load in the short term and phase them out gradually with time. Again, only time will tell if anything we are saying wil come true.

12 Apr 2021 21:26:05
Pegleg instead of attacking me literally no reason, you could just tell me why my comment was tripe in your view or better yet, offer your own opinion or rebuttal on this topic currently under discussion. Surely Offering cogent rebuttals to other people’s comments, is a much better way to engage in healthy debate rather than well, doing whatever it is that you just did. Peace and Love, bro.

13 Apr 2021 00:24:05
Oli do you not think that the progress of the medical department is a double edged sword? I only say that because it seems with us we leave players out with very minor injuries. A stubbed toe is 3 weeks out with Liverpool these days!
I don’t see that with other teams. Kane for example seems to play injured all the time. He gets a bad knock against us and you’d say he’d be out for at least 6 weeks but 2 weeks later he’s strapped up and back out there. Rashford seems to be the same.
I could be wrong as I have zero inside knowledge but we are more cautious since the sports science department got more power. Was it not the reason Buvac left too? That Klopp was listening to the sports science department too much so he felt redundant?

13 Apr 2021 05:28:46
I do understand money is needed and we might loose them on a free in two years and its a bad situation to be in.
Or not. Speculation here but its only a bad situation to be in if mane is performing super and is it that bad if he is performing super. If he is scoring goals for us day in day out only then any other team would take him on extraordinary wages at 32. And well if he is in that good a form at that time it means we are winning stuff so we can always extend his contract.
My point is only about fitness though. Mane bobby and salah are fit. And fitness is as much mental as physical.
This season is a culmination of 3 years of relentless football. I think we will be back next year and you need your best at their best at that time.
Milner is regarded as the best because of his remarkable fitness levels. Similar for ronaldo and messi. They don't get injured.
2023 is the year we think about rebuild.
Not to mention here we have a plethora of players to earn some some cash from and get in a couple of good players.

13 Apr 2021 08:17:53
Beckers, anything can be a double edged sword in life depending on how you manage it. Now with your statement about how a stubbed tie could keep a player at LFC out for 3 weeks, it depends on how badly the player stubbed his toe or the pain threshold of the player, IMO.

Remember when Klopp first arrived and took a sky dig at Studge for not being able to play thru pain or something like that? Remember how Klopp said he knew VVD was in trouble when he could not come back on in the derby cos he has a high threshold of pain? Same with Kane perhaps. You have to factor this in. Also, you don’t want players playing thru pain too much either cos it can do damage to them long term. Ask Gabriel Batistuta or even Rashford who almost broke his back due to Ole overplaying him.

As Buvac, he left cos Klopp was getting better input from Pep and Kornmayer and he felt sidelined and he left. At least, that was the story shared on here by the Ed’s.

13 Apr 2021 17:29:42
But that’s my point Oli. The fitness of a player is taken out of his hands when the sports science department has more control. He might feel like he can play but the sports science department say no. Obviously to protect the player and ultimately the team and the club but I think some other teams are more willing to risk their most important players especially if they have minor knocks.
I might be wrong and it could just be my frustration of this injury hit season that makes it seem that way. There was one point in Jan and Feb where we literally had no clue who would be in the starting line up as there was a new injury after every game.