FOLLOWING Liverpool’s immensely embarrassing 3-1 defeat to the Tigers of Hull City on Sunday, Brendan Rodgers made what can only be described as an ill-advised statement regarding the strength of the squad.
Rodgers commented after the game:
“There’s no doubt the quality in our squad, with all due respect, isn’t big enough to cope with two big players like that missing,” he said. “We still have some very good players. Daniel could be out for up to eight weeks. Philippe [Coutinho] hasn’t trained all week.
“You take those two out and they are two very good players who have been very efficient for us. This period now will test us.”
Now it’s hard to doubt the truth in what Rodgers is saying, our squad will suffer if you take the likes of Coutinho, Sturridge and Agger out of it but it shouldn’t suffer as much as it did on Sunday and while I think few of us would disagree I really think we shouldn’t be asking the manager whose fault he thinks it is.
With the likes of Sakho, Alberto, Aspas and Allen on the bench, that represents over £45 million of Rodgers’ outlay as Liverpool manager, with only Sakho really having shown any kind of fleeting quality in a Red shirt so far.
In fairness to Alberto and Aspas they’ve not had a fair crack of the whip just yet but they’ve clear not shown enough to the manager to warrant giving them a chance. What other reason can there be for an attacking 3 of Henderson, Moses and Sterling be preferred?
Then again, there’s Moses himself, and the on loan Borini who, in fees (both loan and otherwise) have probably set the club back upwards of a further £15 million. If you throw in Ilori and Mignolet too, you’re looking at a combined fee of around £75-£80 million, on which we’ve maybe seen some return on Mignolet and Sakho.
So who’s fault is it that we’ve squandered all those millions on players that just haven’t added any real quality to the squad?
I’m afraid that, unlike Kenny, Brendan doesn’t have a director of football to point the finger at, nor can he say that the club hasn’t provided him with decent funds; the blame falls entirely at the feet of the manager for that.
Now, let me just make it clear that this isn’t an attack on Rodgers, and I know that he has put the blame at his own feet for selection and tactical issues for Sunday’s defeat but I think he also needs to assess why the squad isn’t strong enough when he’s had three transfer windows so far to put his mark on the squad.
With the rare exceptions of the outstanding Coutinho and Sturridge, Rodgers really hasn’t covered himself in glory in the transfer market and after his little admission following the Hull defeat, it’s a concern that the owners may well be reluctant to further fund his forays into the market if he doesn’t even seem to back his own judgement when it comes to selecting players.
Of course, there is still plenty of time for the younger players to come good and, as I said, we’ve seen little of Alberto, Aspas and Ilori yet to make a fair judgement on them but of the 6-7 player we signed in the summer none of them have yet to make themselves indispensable in the same way the two January signings have.
What makes it harder is having to see the likes of Diego Costa (I know, he didn’t exactly sign for anybody else) and Mkhitaryan having such incredible seasons when you consider that we were only a few million away from realistically having the option to sign either.
What we appear to have done is make the squad bigger, whilst not really adding any real quality when, for the same price, we could’ve brought in 2-3 top class players that, whilst they may have made the squad thinner (but is that really an issue, when you consider the strength of the youth teams?) it would certainly have increased the quality of the first team players.
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I’m sick of reason articles like this. Se people are never happy! Yes the squads too thin (at the moment) and yes Rodgers maybe to blame, BUT what’s with this blame culture? Hello? WE ARE FOURTH! We’ve had the best start to a Premier League in years and for that I blame Brendan Rodgers!!
Hello, look at the table again! Is one bad performance and is down to 10’th!
No don’t entirely blame Rodgers cos the board gives him little to spend for now and the future.Maybe if Rodgers gets two or three quality players then the money is finished and there will be no cover or even for the future.Think of Texeira,Sterling,Alberto,Sturridge etc in 4years time.Oh dear FFP rules and our 60,000 seater stadium u are welcome.Get Betrand,Cabaye,Mvila and Mitroglou or Bacca and the league is ours,pls Br,pls fsg.Y.N.W.A For ten years now.
the squad is thinner dn y shld you(rodgers) hv sold out shevely wen he culd hv been cover for gerrad nd coutihno total plank
Last season we would have given a lot to be where we are now, so give Brendan some credit eh? Get behind the team AND the manager poor mouth…
Yes the squad is thin but we are only playing one game a week. Unless we have some extremely bad luck with injuries I don’t see why we can’t maintain a good league position. The owners will not give rodgers lots to spend in january so stop going on about fantasy footballers from god knows where
Me Tyrer, thank you for asking questions! So far, it’s been a honeymoon period, which lasted for over 14 months or so. We haven’t played anyone yet and two defeats leaves us potentially 10’th. against Everton, arsenal, Swansea we were shambles …especially in the second half . Doesn’t fill me with confidence. Not enough mf players? Than why waste money on Allen, Borrini, Alberto? Add to that, why do we concede so many soft goals with : skertel , agger, toure, sakho, Llori? We have more options than many top 4 teams in defence, yet we concede soft goals!
Answers please.
I think now the squad has got bigger, a little better, the quality still isn’t really there.
If in the next two windows, January will be difficult to sign proven quality, TOP PLAYERS are not signed, question marks need to be asked!
If the loan players are anything to go by, not holding my breath.
I know you say two defeats and 10th, two victories and then what, works both ways.
I think now the squad has got bigger, a little better, the quality still isn’t really there.
If in the next two windows, January will be difficult to sign proven quality, TOP PLAYERS are not signed, question marks need to be asked!
If the loan players are anything to go by, not holding my breath.
I know you say two defeats and 10th, two victories tho…
Ian, two wins and what mate? First, second or third? Are you expecting arsenal, Chelsea and city to drop points against southampton , hull and co?
Chelsea almost dropped points last night to…. Sunderland and City’s away record is not great.
Southampton, although just now dropping off, have had a pretty good defence.
Just saying because only defeats were mentioned.
We do currently have the 6 th best squad so current position, although in potential risk, can be solidified, or bettered, results depending.
City and Chelsea have both cost me big accumulator winnings when they lost to lower opposition this season.
City AND Chelsea dropping points, who’d have thought!
if LFc squard is thin, then what do you have to say about arsenal squard? Are they not geting it right? Br remains our problem in terms of selection and tactical approach to game.
Maybe tactically he’s not the best but you mention Arsenal, Wenger has been building his squad/team for some years having been there for over 15.
Last year a large portion of their fans wanted him sacked, all he’s done this year is sign an ex player for free and Ozil, now they are glad he is still there. They could be rebuilding this year and not sitting top had they sacked him.
I think BR and the owners played a big part in retaining Suarez, if I’m not mistaken and had we been in CL, we too may have signed a marquee play maker and be further up the league with space behind.
Sometimes a squad takes time to develop, especially if you have to rectify past mistakes…. Adam, Carroll, Downing, Cole etc spring to mind. I think the mistake from BR was to try build squad first, team second. I’d have done it the other way round. If (if) he captures one or two quality players in Jan, who knows. Yet this time of year over the last, however many years, good squad or bad, we were not really close to CL places, let alone top of the league.
I’m gonna judge him at the end of this season and depending on position, after summer transfer window.
Totally Rodgers fault for wasting all our money . We have the best player in league but a carrot of a manager
This is true . Unfortunately !
What’s with changing the cb combination every week?