This is at least a broader view of the Gerrard issue:
Rory Smith
Last updated at 12:01AM, January 8 2015
Los Angeles Galaxy spent much of yesterday crowing their delight at being able to announce officially the signature of Steven Gerrard on an 18-month contract, starting in June and, worth about £6 million to the 34-year-old.
Chris Klein, the franchise’s president, described Gerrard as “the perfect fit” among “the universe of players that are out there”, not just because of “what he brings to us on the field [but] the character he has off it”. Bruce Arena, the coach who has taken Galaxy to three titles in the past four years, insisted that by the time the Liverpool captain arrives he will “certainly have a plan available” to get the best out of him.
The message was clear: in the eyes of his new employers, Gerrard is the sort of player not only to build a team around, but a club and a brand too. That, most likely, is what tempted Gerrard most during Galaxy’s aggressive pursuit of his signature: the prospect of being what Americans have long referred to as a “franchise player”.
That, essentially, was what was no longer on offer at Anfield. Buried in all of the former England captain’s public utterances this week has been the acknowledgement that, ultimately, what made up his mind to go was Liverpool’s understandable belief that, as he hits his mid-thirties, his game time would have to be managed, a rather cumbersome euphemism for a reduction in status and significance. Gerrard did not want that, so he walked.
There is a yin and yang in football when it comes to superstars. The price for the pleasure of enjoying them is the pain of replacing them. That is the point where Liverpool find themselves now. Whatever Gerrard’s qualities at his best and beyond it, he has always been Anfield’s franchise player, the man around whom the team are built and the club constructed. The focus, now, sharpens on Brendan Rodgers to find out if he is capable of reshaping both without him.
From one, comparatively narrow angle, Gerrard’s departure could make Rodgers’s job easier. In his two and a half years at Anfield, the Northern Irishman has been forced to modify his plans to fit in two players who are not easily categorised.
Luis Suárez, for all his brilliance, relied on a sense of daring to wreak havoc. Rodgers is a manager who wants his players to cherish the ball; the Uruguayan’s genius is quite how willing he is to risk losing it. Similar could be said of Gerrard: his preference for the raking pass, or the powerful burst forward, was the secret of his success, but it was not necessarily a natural fit with Rodgers’s philosophy.
Between them, Suárez and Gerrard forced the former Swansea City manager to shift from his avowed belief in “death by football” to a more dynamic, less controlled style.
Rodgers initially wanted Liverpool to look like Barcelona’s classical orchestra; his twin titans meant they ended up resembling the heavy metal of Borussia Dortmund.
Next season, both will be gone, and that tension will have disappeared. It will, unquestionably, be Rodgers’s team, constructed in his image that requires no compromises to be made. This is where Gerrard’s departure makes Rodgers’s job substantially harder: when a club do not have a franchise player, that honour and that pressure switches to the manager.
Liverpool, on the other hand, will no longer be built around Gerrard. They will be built around, and built by, Brendan Rodgers. He will be the franchise player. If they fail, it will be on him, and him alone.
Rory Smith
Last updated at 12:01AM, January 8 2015
Los Angeles Galaxy spent much of yesterday crowing their delight at being able to announce officially the signature of Steven Gerrard on an 18-month contract, starting in June and, worth about £6 million to the 34-year-old.
Chris Klein, the franchise’s president, described Gerrard as “the perfect fit” among “the universe of players that are out there”, not just because of “what he brings to us on the field [but] the character he has off it”. Bruce Arena, the coach who has taken Galaxy to three titles in the past four years, insisted that by the time the Liverpool captain arrives he will “certainly have a plan available” to get the best out of him.
The message was clear: in the eyes of his new employers, Gerrard is the sort of player not only to build a team around, but a club and a brand too. That, most likely, is what tempted Gerrard most during Galaxy’s aggressive pursuit of his signature: the prospect of being what Americans have long referred to as a “franchise player”.
That, essentially, was what was no longer on offer at Anfield. Buried in all of the former England captain’s public utterances this week has been the acknowledgement that, ultimately, what made up his mind to go was Liverpool’s understandable belief that, as he hits his mid-thirties, his game time would have to be managed, a rather cumbersome euphemism for a reduction in status and significance. Gerrard did not want that, so he walked.
There is a yin and yang in football when it comes to superstars. The price for the pleasure of enjoying them is the pain of replacing them. That is the point where Liverpool find themselves now. Whatever Gerrard’s qualities at his best and beyond it, he has always been Anfield’s franchise player, the man around whom the team are built and the club constructed. The focus, now, sharpens on Brendan Rodgers to find out if he is capable of reshaping both without him.
From one, comparatively narrow angle, Gerrard’s departure could make Rodgers’s job easier. In his two and a half years at Anfield, the Northern Irishman has been forced to modify his plans to fit in two players who are not easily categorised.
Luis Suárez, for all his brilliance, relied on a sense of daring to wreak havoc. Rodgers is a manager who wants his players to cherish the ball; the Uruguayan’s genius is quite how willing he is to risk losing it. Similar could be said of Gerrard: his preference for the raking pass, or the powerful burst forward, was the secret of his success, but it was not necessarily a natural fit with Rodgers’s philosophy.
Between them, Suárez and Gerrard forced the former Swansea City manager to shift from his avowed belief in “death by football” to a more dynamic, less controlled style.
Rodgers initially wanted Liverpool to look like Barcelona’s classical orchestra; his twin titans meant they ended up resembling the heavy metal of Borussia Dortmund.
Next season, both will be gone, and that tension will have disappeared. It will, unquestionably, be Rodgers’s team, constructed in his image that requires no compromises to be made. This is where Gerrard’s departure makes Rodgers’s job substantially harder: when a club do not have a franchise player, that honour and that pressure switches to the manager.
Liverpool, on the other hand, will no longer be built around Gerrard. They will be built around, and built by, Brendan Rodgers. He will be the franchise player. If they fail, it will be on him, and him alone.
