Inevitably perhaps, considering that Liverpool have appointed a Frenchman as Director of Football Strategy recently, but many of the recent transfer rumours surrounding Liverpool Football Club have had a Gallic taste to them. In many cases, it maybe just lazy journalist randomly picking out French names from a hat to initiate another round of rumours, but I would like to think there is no small smoke without fire, especially with the amount of French players being linked with the Reds.
After all, it is not much of a stretch to suggest that as head of player recruitment, Damien Comolli’s preferred targets would be in France as it is the market which he is most familiar with. Added to the fact that Roy Hodgson has watched Lille, Rennes and Saint-Etienne in action over recent times, it does suggest also that he maybe looking over some targets suggested by Comolli. The list of names that have been linked with Liverpool over recent weeks then is not surprising. Yvann M’Vila, Dimitri Payet, Blaise Matuidi, Mamodou Sakho, Eden Hazard, Gervinho, Karim Benzema and Antoine Griezmann have all one thing in common; they are young. One of the most important aspects of NESV’s transfer policy. In addition they are either French or have played in the French league suggesting Comolli has already changed the focus of Liverpool’s scouting department. Under Chief Scout Eduardo Macia and previous manager Rafa Benitez many of the transfer links inevitably came from Spain but Macia’s influence is seemingly on the wane with transfers under the guidance of Comolli.
So are the French connections a good thing? They are certainly both positive and negative aspects to such a focus on young French talent. Firstly to the positives:
Continue Reading on Page 2 . . .
Live4Liverpool is recruiting columnists. For further info contact the site editor at editor@live4liverpool.com
Lemmy and his band Motorhead at a French bar
This week it is even more of former Liverpool WAG Edita Hortova.
llllllllllllllllllll
CLICK ON THE IMAGE OR HERE TO GET TO THE GALLERY
If Liverpool want to sign French players why don’t they sign Nzogbia from Wigan. They should also put Mavinga in at leftback.
Deuf was not French though. I think, France produces the most young talents in midfield & defence in Europe. French players have hardly disapointed in England. Mostly, French players of similar value are technically far superior & skillful than their English counterparts. Moreover they are physically much more suited for epl than the Latin or even Spanish players. Investing on young French players hardly has gone wrong in epl (Chheyru may be one odd example, but few french boys were unluckey at lfc due to a change in manager). Over the last few years, France has finished among top 4 for almost every Euro age group tournaments & there are so many talented youth in French legue that, if targeted logically, it’s hardly going to fail.
Now, wheather the French connection is good or bad, depends on what players they are targeting & how the manager is planning. Almost entire Arsenal recent success is build on French & Dutch players, MU probably had their best ever EPL player from France, apart from Maluda & Anelka, Essien & Drogba are from legue 1.
i do think it’s just lazy journalism picking players that St. Etienne were linked with.
there may be some truth to a story (perhaps a scout, roy or kenny watching) but just because they are watching doesn’t mean a bid is imminent. As Commolli said, the scouts pass on recommendations to Commoli – he watches them, then kenny, then roy and the proposal is put to the board.
Would sooner trust the judgement of Macia to be honest. We had a load of French youngsters that came to nothing. Now, we have some promising Spanish youngsters who Roy won’t play.
I think the NESV philosophy goes against Roy has ever been. He’s never been into developing youth players – ask Fulham fans, apparently he NEVER even went to the youth academy during his two and half year spell.
Just makes me think Roy is on borrowed time. His style of play is negative and seems content with one half decent performance in every 5-6 games. True mid-table mentality. Before long, we will have sold all our great players and have the entire Fulham first team if he gets his way.
If we are looking to get young players who have potential to be world class then we should be looking at Hazard, N’Zogbia and Stocker. Hazard is a highly rated winger who will no doubt become a top class player, N’Zogbia has proved his quality in the Premier League and can play in a number of postions in midfield and has a excellent left foot while Stocker can play out wide and in the centre and would only cost around 5 mil.