Georginio Wijnaldum, Gary Cahill, Wayne Hennessey, Steve Mouyokolo, Steven Pienaar, Chung-Yong Lee: no, they are not players linked with a move to mid-table Premier League club but to 5 times European Cup winners Liverpool, if the media is to be believed. With the exception of Steven Pienaar and possibly Gary Cahill, all of these players are not at the level required to help Liverpool improve next season. They are players who have been scouted to work within a tight budget, one which Rafa Benitez will be restricted to if he doesn’t sell players. The sale of the club can’t come soon enough for the Liverpool management, but it won’t be in time for the summer close season, where Rafa might be in the process of the most severe shake-up of his squad since his first season at Anfield.
The problem becomes, how do you re-shape a squad without any money? The solution is of course to sell before you buy, and there have been just as many rumours about players leaving as they are about those coming in. The question is though, with the money available, are you changing players to improve the squad or are you just changing for changes sake. In the case of Mouyokolo, Wijnaldum and Chung-Yong Lee, the latter looks to be more the case. Certainly, if the rumours are to be believed, Rafa is looking in the right areas to improve the team with Wijnaldum and Chung-Yong Lee both effectively young wingers. But if you ask me whether they will be an improvement on Albert Riera, and perhaps Yossi Benayoun or Ryan Babel, I couldn’t tell you. In Wijnaldum’s case, he is an unproven talent in a big European league and his goalscoring record for Feyenoord doesn’t blow you away. For Lee, he has had at least a year in the Premier League but he is definitely no where near the finished product at aged 21.
Then we come to Steven Pienaar, a talented winger and creative player but is it worth a controversial move across Stanley Park? A said valuation of £16million, even with his contract ending next season, is the South African international worth that? In my opinion, his skill set is very similar to Benayoun, he loves running with the ball, and he can also play on the left hand side like the Israeli, picking out great passes with his right foot. I would rather keep with Benayoun than shell out the cash on Pienaar to be perfectly honest with you.
In regards to the apparent interest in central defenders (as well as Gary Cahill, Benitez has been linked with Steven Mouyokolo of Hull City and young Rangers centre back Danny Wilson), aren’t their bigger priorities? No doubt, the backline has not been at its best this season, and Jamie Carragher is no spring chicken, but if money is going to be available, it should go towards another striker to help out the overworked Fernando Torres. The over-reliance on the Spaniard must have played a part in the striker’s struggles with injury over the last two years. The purchase of a decent player to play along side him, or as backup, should be a top priority for the summer. Perhaps Cahill could be Carragher’s long term replacement but let’s wait until next summer when we might have a bit more money to spend on players.
Of course, the list of players above are derived from rumours but I would be very surprised if a few of them are not genuine targets. Everyone knows it will be difficult to compete with the top English clubs in the summer because of the club’s money problems, but if this is the level of player we are looking at, I would be very worried indeed. In some cases I would keep the player’s we’ve got, others could be replaced with loan signings so that money could be made available to fund a bigger name player. Let’s hope Rafa can wheel and deal with the best of them.
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Benítez should not get one Penny to spend on players anymore. He would waste it anyway. Look, he has spent close to 20m on a player who can’t get a game in a position where strengthening wasn’t exactly needed instead of buying another forward, probably the position our squad is the thinnest. Why didn’t he stop playing Gerrard out of position to fill the void left by Alonsos departure. I think he want’s to ruin our club. Nothing can happen to him. He will get a huge pay-off should he get sacked, his reputation in Spain will not suffer.
Although they are bringing in Jovanovic they need to spend up on a top quality striker and a class left sided player, Joe Cole and Jovetic hit the spot.
Our left flank & Striker is the MAJOR concerned. No need to bring Lee or Wijnaldum. We already have Johnson to raid from the right wing and Kelly to fill in the full back slot. We need someone who can sparks the game from the left wing and unfortunately they’re very rare nowadays. Names like Ribery, Juan Mata, Silva, Hazard, Di Maria, Turan, etc one of them should be brought to improve the team significantly.
If Liverpool want to take another central defender then someone should be sold also to balance it. We’ve got Kyrgiakos, Ayala, dan San Jose on the book. The big Greek should be shown the door if the new one comes. Ayala got the potential to make it let’s keep him or sold him. While San Jose established himself in Bilbao starting eleven and probably they want to make it permanently, so let takes the chance to used him as a make weight deal for Javi Martinez.
As for striker Jovanovic almost certainly joined us but we need more firepower and Ngog is not the man. We should make money from the sales of fringe players or make a gamble on Lauri Dalla Valle or Nemeth week in week out