Sadio Mane

[Gary25]

Big difference in quality between Rodgers and Klopp when it comes to the ability of building a team though. A winning team.

Klopp still has it all to prove with us. He worked wonders at Dortmund and nobody can take that away from him but he's now in an even more competitive and demanding League where he's under the spotlight like never before.

Another thing that I find annoying is this slightly naive view people have that should we sign a few players for small (ish) fees that Klopp will automatically turn them into stars because he did it with a few players at Dortmund. If only it was that simple.

Don't mean to sound harsh on Klopp there but as the man says himself...he's no miracle worker. He has a bloody huge task on his hands to try and make us compete again. It'll be anything but easy.

 

[mom]

But all of that development investment is pointless if you then go and spunk over the odds for more of the same of what you already have. I like Mane, but £30m is going over Benteke, Carroll, Downing etc territory. What's the point in trying to save the club money by investing in youth at minimal fees, to then go and blow a wad aimlessly on a player of the ilk you could get from Europe for half the fee? I don't get it.

Kenny and Brendan both got lambasted forever for this sort of strategy, with people blaming the shite Premiership based signings on them, and crediting the committee with any overseas signing that was a success. The only constant under the last three managers is overpaid for Premiership players. The three can't coincidentally all be that fucking stupid.

you need a balance. if we don't perform next year the majority will be slagging him off saying he should have bought some decent players in to go along with the youth/projects. I think most fans will be demanding a big signing or two, and I agree with them.

 

[mom]

what's hilarious is that we're all moaning about this, but once the Mancs or Chelsea nick him, we'll be moaning about how great he would have been and how it's the board's fault for losing grip of yet another decent signing.

 

[Delinquent]

I think rather than spending exorbitant fees on Southampton players every summer we should be a bit more cunning. A more effective strategy might be to offer an exorbitant fee for a Southampton player, wait to see who they plan to replace him with, then by that player instead.

 

[mark1975]

Brendan was a bad manager tactically. He never had a plan B. Not in a single game he showed that he had a plan B that worked. 100% attack was the only plan he had. He didn't show in a single game that we could close a game. If we took the lead we had to continue to attack because Rodgers didn't had a clue how to defend, not a clue.

When the teams found him out he had no answers. He couldn't change. He never tried to use our oppositions weaknesses because he didn't have a clue how to do it. When the opposition played a very slow team he didn't had a clue how to use that weakness against them. Mourinho found him out big time for example. We didn't need to win and Chelsea wasn't interested in playing attacking football but he only had one plan, plan A. 100% attack instead of playing for a draw.

Fuck off Arn.

 

[mark1975]

Unless I'm mistaken his output is better than our midfielders.
He's probably worth more than Lallana and less than Coutinho.
So his price in the current market seems normal.

So I still don't get the 'more of the same' thing.
Why ignore the difference in style as well? Is speed and directness not worth some extra money for the current Liverpool squad?

He's averaged 10 goals a season, playing wide of a front 3 or 4. Thats on a par with Berger, Riise, Murphy & Kuyt. Its a good contribution and his directness is something we lack. I just think it's a tier below what we actually need for us to push on. We have too many strikers to justify buying an out and out one, so we need a wide forward who is top tier quality. Mane? Coutinho and Sturridge can be on their day, but for varying reasons neither can be relied upon to be, which is why we have to supplement that with a 3rd player of absolute quality, I don't think Mane at 30m is that.

 

[Nir.Barak]

I honestly forgot all about him. We'll do well to get 7 or 8mil and get him off the books.

We'll do well to not buy him a plane ticket back from Turkey.

 

[Hansern]

As much as I want to agree, It's a bit early to be saying that..

Klopp built a title winning side with Dortmund, and Rodgers built?
Not to early to point out the difference in quality.

 

[Hansern]

I think rather than spending exorbitant fees on Southampton players every summer we should be a bit more cunning. A more effective strategy might be to offer an exorbitant fee for a Southampton player, wait to see who they plan to replace him with, then by that player instead.

If that was Redmond, then I'm quite happy we missed out.

 

[HC]

Klopp built a title winning side with Dortmund, and Rodgers built?
Not to early to point out the difference in quality.

Let's just stick to achievements that matter to us, eh.

 

[Hansern]

Let's just stick to achievements that matter to us, eh.

Yeah, thats a different story. But you cant exclude his experience either.
Nor the experience of his backroom staff. That would be a bit foolish.

 

[rurikbird]

He's averaged 10 goals a season, playing wide of a front 3 or 4. Thats on a par with Berger, Riise, Murphy & Kuyt. Its a good contribution and his directness is something we lack. I just think it's a tier below what we actually need for us to push on. We have too many strikers to justify buying an out and out one, so we need a wide forward who is top tier quality. Mane? Coutinho and Sturridge can be on their day, but for varying reasons neither can be relied upon to be, which is why we have to supplement that with a 3rd player of absolute quality, I don't think Mane at 30m is that.

You may have a valid point, but which top-tier player do you think we should get instead? I wanted us to go for Sane, Dembele and Gotze (although the latter doesn't quite add the pace and directness like the other two), but it seems we will miss out on all 3. Who else is available?

 

[rurikbird]

Mane's streakiness concerns me somewhat, but I also think that he has room to grow and become an even better and possibly more consistent player – he is not a player who is already at his peak like Downing was when we bought him or a fundamentally flawed or limited player like Carroll and Benteke (I'm throwing these names around not because they are in any way similar to Mane, but because people keep using them and others as examples why buying expensive EPL players is supposedly always a bad idea). I think we should judge each player on his own merits and not let only superficially related examples cloud our judgement. Mane is a technically solid, versatile, intelligent player who still has room for improvement – let's stop beating him with a "Downing" or "Lallana" stick.

And as for streakiness, while it's not an ideal trait in an attacking player, it's much less of a problem for wingers than it would be, say, for centre-forwards. Let's take Bayern's Douglas Costa as an example – he started the season in torrid form, with 1 goal and 10 (!) assists in the first 7 league games. After that he has significantly cooled off and only collected 3 goals and 4 assists for the rest of the season. Still, I'm sure Bayern are very glad they signed him and even when he didn't score, he has helped the team win, by stretching defenses with his pace and directness. It's not like Crouch, Morientes or Robbie Keane, whose job is to be the finisher and a focal point of the attack, going on a dozen or more game non-scoring streak – then it hurts the team for sure.

 

[LeTallecWiz]

Let's take Bayern's Douglas Costa as an example – he started the season in torrid form, with 1 goal and 10 (!) assists in the first 7 league games. After that he has significantly cooled off and only collected 3 goals and 4 assists for the rest of the season. Still, I'm sure Bayern are very glad they signed him and even when he didn't score, he has helped the team win, by stretching defenses with his pace and directness.

Good point Rurik.

 

[Arn]

Fuck off Arn.

So name ONE game that he had a plan B that worked. ONE game that we could play "italian" style football and close the game. We could only play 100% attacking football. At the end of the season the players was to tired to be able to do that. In some games during a season you must be able to play defensive style football so the players don't need to work their socks off every minute on the pitch.

You can already see now with Klopp that we play defensive football in part of the games and sometimes whole games. It is not only gegenpressing because you get to many injuries and tired players if you play gegenpressing in every game. He already is working with a plan A and a plan B.

The Chelsea game showed how limited manager Rodgers is. He can't change. If he get a couple of injuries to key players then he is fucked big time because he can't change. We needed to play a different style of football the season after we finished second because Suarez had been sold Sturridge was out injured but guess what? We didn't. We still tried to play 100% attacking football even that we didn't had the players to do it. The reason, he couldn't change.

Rodgers have one plan, plan A. If that don't work then he is fucked.

 

[mark1975]

You may have a valid point, but which top-tier player do you think we should get instead? I wanted us to go for Sane, Dembele and Gotze (although the latter doesn't quite add the pace and directness like the other two), but it seems we will miss out on all 3. Who else is available?

But we've been here before Rurik, and posters seem to end up drawing the same conclusion - no one else is available so we have to take what we can get. That's the reason we are where we are. I'm not going to start grabbing names out of thin air, but I don't buy that the market has inflated that much that £30m is a good price for Mane and I don't buy that there aren't better alternatives out there for the same price or less. We're a multi million pound brand, we hire people who are supposed to be at the top end of the game. So why are we seemingly stuck in the territory of £4m - £7m punts on 18-21 maybes, £15m - £20m overpayments on 22-24 year old hopefuls and then £25m - £40m on overpriced Premiership based players. There's got to be a better strategy than this, particularly when we repeatedly seem to be going down the same route with a more than sketchy success rate.

I get why we would go for someone with his qualities - directness, pace, the ability to chip in with goals and real wide play, but like I said. The two real top class players we have, only have the capability to do that fleetingly, we need someone with out and out quality who can win us games. I don't think 10 goals a season from Mane is the difference between 8th and becoming a title challenger. And when you throw in the fee, at face value it looks like he would be the big Liverpool signing of the Summer. It's not enough.

 

[Red Bird]

A proper response to " ... who else is there ..." is to ask the question how come a player who cost Southampton just over £10 million is likely to go to Liverpool for about three times that much?

 

[Hansern]

Or why we turned down the chance to sign him for 10 mill 2 years ago, only to pay 15-20 mill more now.
Instead we bought Lallana for 25 mill. Yet Mane was surley better suited to us 2 years ago.

 

[LeTallecWiz]

Can people CALM THE FUCK DOWN please (especially you Asim)?

He's going to sign for Spurs in 2-3 weeks.

 

[manwithnoname]

Exactly, Mane on his own might not sound like a exciting signing but when you put him in an XI with the likes of sturridge origi coutinho firmino markovic lallana can it's going to be mouthwatering.

I get the distinct impression that your mouth waters almost all of the time anyway

And I'd love to see the formation you are playing with Origi (mediocre), Markovic (Hahahaha, he's fucking shit), Sturridge, Lallana (not good enough) Coutinho, Firmino (not good enough) Can and Mane all your mouthwatering XI

 

[mom]

I think rather than spending exorbitant fees on Southampton players every summer we should be a bit more cunning. A more effective strategy might be to offer an exorbitant fee for a Southampton player, wait to see who they plan to replace him with, then by that player instead.

That's not the Liverpool Way.

 

[mom]

Can people CALM THE FUCK DOWN please (especially you Asim)?

He's going to sign for Spurs in 2-3 weeks.

Innit.

 

[Hansern]

I get the distinct impression that your mouth waters almost all of the time anyway

And I'd love to see the formation you are playing with Origi (mediocre), Markovic (Hahahaha, he's fucking shit), Sturridge, Lallana (not good enough) Coutinho, Firmino (not good enough) Can and Mane all your mouthwatering XI

Mane Firmino Coutinho
Studge/Origi

Thats pretty boss in all honesty. The Firmino and Origi hate is strange. Very strange.

 

[manwithnoname]

Mane Firmino Coutinho
Studge/Origi

Thats pretty boss in all honesty. The Firmino and Origi hate is strange. Very strange.

I don't hate them.

Origi is simply not a very good finisher at all. That's obvious to anyone . Firmino is gifted, but slow and horribly inconsistent. There's no way we can afford to have him, Coutinho and Lallana in the same side.

 

[Mystic]

It really fucks me off when people say "why didn't we just sign him for £10million two years ago" as if the player just sits on their arse and doesn't improve in the two years they spend at Southampton. It's such a nonsense argument, we buy expensive from Southampton because they've improved the player to a level where they can walk into our team by giving him the first team time we wouldn't have, and also they have taken the risk and proved that the player can adapt to the premier league, it's hardly like they all do, I don't see any of you clamouring that we should have signed Dani Osvaldo after all.

 

[mom]

Saints have just signed a winger so maybe he's a replacement for Mane. Can't be arsed researching it properly so take what you want from it.

 

[manwithnoname]

It really fucks me off when people say "why didn't we just sign him for £10million two years ago" as if the player just sits on their arse and doesn't improve in the two years they spend at Southampton. It's such a nonsense argument, we buy expensive from Southampton because they've improved the player to a level where they can walk into our team by giving him the first team time we wouldn't have, and also they have taken the risk and proved that the player can adapt to the premier league, it's hardly like they all do, I don't see any of you clamouring that we should have signed Dani Osvaldo after all.

It's only a nonsense argument if you take a binary view of it, like you have.

Did one year at Leicester turn Kante into a 25m superstar? His improvement so fucking amazing that he's now an international and everyone from PSG to Arsenal interested?

What about Payet? Totally unknown until playing under managerial genius Bilic and world class talent like Noble and Tomkins improved his skills so much that Real want him?

Both sides of the argument have merit; our scouting is either risk-averse or just shit. Perhaps we have different (wrong) sets of criteria. Maybe it's all of these things.

And saying we buy players that have been improved to such a level that they could 'walk' into our team is risible, since about half the regular first team squad shouldn't be in our first team.

Lots of players haven't improved themselves. They've just proved themselves.

 

[mark1975]

It really fucks me off when people say "why didn't we just sign him for £10million two years ago" as if the player just sits on their arse and doesn't improve in the two years they spend at Southampton. It's such a nonsense argument, we buy expensive from Southampton because they've improved the player to a level where they can walk into our team by giving him the first team time we wouldn't have, and also they have taken the risk and proved that the player can adapt to the premier league, it's hardly like they all do, I don't see any of you clamouring that we should have signed Dani Osvaldo after all.

It's not really a nonsense argument, it's the crux of the point. Southampton bought him for £10m two years ago. Why aren't we doing this? Why aren't we finding these players at that stage, instead of a couple of years later when they have had their price grossly inflated thanks to a relatively short spell of good form? I think that's a fair argument.

Like I said, people are already talking up this midfield lad we've bought as a shrewd piece of business, so for all this clever talent spotting for a pittance (that's failed so many times, it's untrue), why the fuck do we repeatedly feel the need to supplement that, or rather completely undo it, by blowing a wad at a bloated Premiership transfer? It's a strategy that's failed so many times, it's nigh on impossible to back it up as being good business OR football sense.

 

[Frogfish]

It's not really a nonsense argument, it's the crux of the point. Southampton bought him for £10m two years ago. Why aren't we doing this? Why aren't we finding these players at that stage, instead of a couple of years later when they have had their price grossly inflated thanks for a relatively short spell of good form?

On paper it's a simple question however why didn't United, Chelsea, City, Spurs or Arsenal or for that matter even Bayern, Juventus, PSG (best placed), Atletico, Barca or Real pick up Kante or Payet ?
The answer probably lies in they, like us, can only take so many gambles, sometimes they pay off others times they don't. We can't beat ourselves up for missing out on gems of that quality.

 

[mark1975]

So name ONE game that he had a plan B that worked. ONE game that we could play "italian" style football and close the game. We could only play 100% attacking football. At the end of the season the players was to tired to be able to do that. In some games during a season you must be able to play defensive style football so the players don't need to work their socks off every minute on the pitch.

You can already see now with Klopp that we play defensive football in part of the games and sometimes whole games. It is not only gegenpressing because you get to many injuries and tired players if you play gegenpressing in every game. He already is working with a plan A and a plan B.

The Chelsea game showed how limited manager Rodgers is. He can't change. If he get a couple of injuries to key players then he is fucked big time because he can't change. We needed to play a different style of football the season after we finished second because Suarez had been sold Sturridge was out injured but guess what? We didn't. We still tried to play 100% attacking football even that we didn't had the players to do it. The reason, he couldn't change.

Rodgers have one plan, plan A. If that don't work then he is fucked.

I've got no fucking idea what you're going on about or what relevance Rodgers has to this thread. I made a point about the only constant throughout the reign of our last three managers being a very similar transfer strategy. So what you are you going on about the failures of Rodgers for?