Liverpool FC Team Talk, Gossip, Rumours 2024/25

Que Everton bounce.

Bit harsh on Marsch - he's done an awful lot more in his managerial career than Lampard has. Really, Frank should be known as the Brit Jesse Marsch!

He was very good for an hour or so I thought, but died a death at that stage. Dame in the last game, the kid hasn't the engine yet to last 90 minutes, let alone do it twice a week - and if we overwork him we'll crock him.

We gotta mind him.

Dead cat?

Latest midfielder we are linked to on twitter is a loan move for Ryan Gravenberch

If it's on twitter, it's 100 per cent true!

Actually 110% true

Gerrard began his career getting 10-20 minutes in a handful of games and the Premier League is a lot more demanding now than it was over 20 years ago. No teenager should be expected to be available to play minutes in central midfield every week especially in a dysfunctional team. Tyler Morton is older than Bajcetic and has gone on loan to Blackburn this season where he has played in every league game, he has started 24 games to date and it is beginning to take its toll.

Blackburn's recent dip in form has coincided with the club captain and Morton's midfield partner being rested while Morton played the three games in the week of the Christmas period. Since then he has been affected by tiredness late on in games. Against Bristol City at the weekend, Blackburn took the lead against the run of play when he ran beyond the forward line and cut the ball back for Bradley Dack to score. Blackburn could have been 2-0 up at that point, but Brereton Diaz didn't have his shooting boots on. After the goal, Blackburn were on the back foot. Morton was partially at fault for Bristol City's equaliser in the 68th minute because he was tired and could do nothing more than stick a leg out to prevent Zak Vyner from getting a shot on goal. Daniel Ayala was sent off for a soft yellow card minutes later and by the end of the game Morton was knackered and just a walking body on the pitch.

The loan period has been a good experience for Morton but he is being overplayed at this point, and at the same time Jon Dahl Tomasson is rotating his own midfield players. Recalling him would add another midfield rotation option for the remainder of the season and prevent him from sustaining an injury due to tiredness.

The Athletic are saying that the Qatar rumours were just rumours, and that the most likely investment for them is a 15% stake in Spurs

That's not what they are saying though. They are saying QSI were in talks to take a small investment in Spurs but QSI have never been linked to Liverpool but rather QSA.

Either way I've made my feelings on middle eastern oil money buying the club as a sportswashing venture very clear.

He'll get his chance when Klopp decides that he's ready. He missed out on pre-season and only began training with the first team on September 29th.

It should be remembered that Andy Robertson had 5 months training with the group before Klopp felt he was ready to be a regular fullback. Tsimikas was signed as a backup to Robertson and only started 3 games in his first season, his league debut was in February.

Newcastle picked up 38 points in the second half of last season, only Liverpool and Man City outperformed them in that period. They also picked up 38 points in the first 19 games of this season so they have maintained their consistency. Given their resources that shouldn't be surprising.

In the past 2 summers Newcastle have spent over €260m on transfers and recouped only €2.3m in sales.

Chelsea drop 460 mill in the Jan transfer window while sitting in 10th place.

Aresnal have 2 or 3 signings already this window and were looking to spend over 80 million on a player Chelsea pipped them too.

United and City can spend similarly if they need to and offer high wages.

The PL is already a financial super league that we've punched above our weight for about 5 seasons now.

They've the best defence in the league - that's been the biggest difference for them, and what has them where they are. Every one of their back 5, and their best midfielder in front of them, has been bought since the Saudi takeover. The money has been absolutely instrumental. (They're also I think the 3rd highest spender in the world since the takeover).

They've bought pretty well for sure, but they did spend an absolutely massive fortune on an entire team revamp. Put simply - without that spending, they would not be anywhere near where they are. The success is down to those purchases, and a manager who has done well with them.

That’s NabyLad out for another 6 months so.

Christ... hopefully this is found to be shenanigans on Juve's side, rather than the player being complicit in it. It's not up to him what they put down on their books, as long as anywhere he's declared his own wages/taxes is done correctly - so let's hope they are! Been a disaster of a loan obviously, but he could actually be very useful when he finally comes back given our problems. Especially when the Champions League games start rolling in.

Depends on what you mean by "where they are now"... They're getting a hair under 2 points per game. That's not unreasonable to have guessed with 250+m of incomings - particularly an entirely new defence. Their league position is particularly good, but that's dictated by how well/badly other teams do. In another season where some of Liverpool/Chelsea/Spurs weren't underperforming so badly that same 1.9ppg could see them in 6th or 7th.

They deserve credit for good management and astute buys - but it simply can't be forgotten that their spending has been the backbone of all of it.

(Also, while we've spent ~120million on those two lads, we've also recouped 80m in sales... Newcastle is just all spending)

Ok - but obviously there's two aspects to "Who thought they'd be third and ten points ahead of Liverpool?". They've done well, but Liverpool (and others) are a bigger cause of that points difference than Newcastle are.

I wouldn't say they're necessarily home and hosed either... they've a game more played, and a lot of football yet to come. Will be interesting to see if they can stay riding high over the next 18 matches. Many's the first half season we've seen go well, before a falling off. From Arsenal themselves plenty of times. And from ourselves and especially Spurs in 20/21, where they were league challengers at Christmas and finished 7th.

Newcastle did buy really well for the defence and Guimarães in midfield though, which their success has been built upon.

And they had good players in Joelinton and Saint Maxim that Steve Bruce didn't know how to use that Howe inherited.

Exactly. There's a lot to be said for that. They could have done a Chelsea on it.

The signings of Bruno G & Botman were very 'Liverpool 2017-2019' signings. They transformed the team between them, along with Tripper who seems to have taken on the role of leader very well. Those players would start for most clubs in the league, if not all.

The Saudi's weren't stupid, they didn't piss money up the wall immediately after acquiring the club unlike Abramovich at Chelsea or QSI at Man City. They brought in a competent manager who knew how to utilise the decent players in the squad and identified what needed to be fixed.

The Championship level players all made way and given the club's new found wealth burning their contracts wasn't a concern. The fortunes of Newcastle were no longer tied to the likes of Ciaran Clark, Jeff Hendrick, Jonjo Shelvey, Isaac Hayden, Dwight Gayle and Andy Carroll being at their best. The signing of Guimaraes gave them a platform in midfield and the entire back line and goalkeeper were replaced. As a result Newcastle don't concede many goals, a consequence of that is they don't need to score very many in order to win games.

Howe has spoken of how the target for this season was to push for qualifying for the Europa League either by finishing up the league or winning a domestic cup competition. Given the fall off of both Chelsea and Liverpool, those clubs that would have expected to be scrapping it out for the Europa League places have found themselves two or three places higher and now Champions League qualification is a possibility. A total of 66-71 points has been sufficient to qualify for the Champions League in the past number of seasons, Newcastle's points total for their last 38 league games is 77 points.