KopTalk.com Forums Football Liverpool FC Forum Henderson Done Deal - Ngog on the way out?

Your confusing me for yourself.

You'd love to be as cool as me.

This surely means a deal for Aquilani is in the pipeline ..... FSG seem to be willing only to spend money that theyr're getting from sales topped up by revenue from other areas of the club so I suspect Aqua is gone too. How to get rid of pulsen jovanovic and a few others is the question? Is cole going to spurs ... reports yesterday said yes?

i think the main talking point over this transfer is the hefty price tag. just trying to point out the potential henderson has and how much he could be worth in the future. ofcourse it benefits lfc especially in terms of re-sale value. how can you not want an lfc player to further his career at international level? every player wants to play for his country. you can slate england all you want... but that won't stop you from supporting them at the next major tournament will it? thats if you're english

But Henderson and Carrol aren’t exactly proven in the premiership are they and yet together they have cost well over £50m – which IMO represents questionable value for money

Carrol had a good half-season with Newcastle then came to us an it all went downhill from there (largely owing to injury) whereas Henderson had half a dozen half-decent games, got an England call-up then didn’t perform after that


It’s all well and good having English players – but not if there are better and less expensive foreign ones available – which there seem to be

Why would you suspect an English player had a even brighter future than a foreign one. Look at our most recent English signings – Konchesky, Joe Cole, Glen Johnson (a good player but not worth £18m), Pennant, Crouch. None of them have been major successes compared to foreign players we have signed during the same period – say Kuyt, Torres, Merieles, Luis Garcia, Reina - most of whom were cheaper and have had considerably better Anfield careers.

The lack of emerging English talent is well documented and whilst the likes of Spearing, Kelly and Flanagan have shown that there still is English talent out there, paying top dollar on a gamble that might or might not pay off seems a risky strategy

Any player is worth only what any manager is prepared to pay for him! how does anyone know how much any player is worth? at least until he puts his boots on and shows us what hes made of,then and only then will you know! if he settles well, gels with the other team mates,and produces the goods then hes great! if hes sh*te then hes not worth the money granted!lets wait and see!

you make some valid points, and while it's true that Rafa bought a significant amount of Spanish talent to Anfield, he also bought a great deal of dross from other leagues (perhaps not in money terms, but certainly in terms of quantity of players). He would not have signed these players had they been without merit, so to suggest that a cheaper foreign player has to be better value for money is not necessarily true.

I'm not saying that the future is British, or that British players will prove to be better in the long run, but Dalglish is in a stage of building for the future rather than trying to win the title in 2011/2012. He needs people who aren't going to want to leave the club, he needs continuity, and if we're honest loyalty to the club is not particularly high on the agenda of a foreign player.

Perhaps we will overspend now, perhaps our squad will not be as strong as it could be given the money we can generate, but I think it's sound strategy that money spent now will not need to be re-spent in 3 years time when our star players get itchy feet and want to play for Real Madrid rather than winning the EPL.

All fair points Thunder, but given that these British players we are signing aren't from the Liverpool area it's a little naive to expect them to be any more loyal to Liverpool than players coming from overseas

Success breads loyality - but when the likes of N'Zogbia, Phil Jones & Ashley Young turn you down, and you end up paying massively inflated prices for British players who might turn out good it's time to worry

Marquee signing? I don't think there will be one as without any European football to offer, we will be unable to compete for the top players - whether they be English or foreign

For all of Houllier and Beniez flaws in the transfer market, they were at least able to attract top class signings to the club, something we so obviously can't do now - which is why we are paying £36m for Caroll and £20m for Henderson

Jim, if we cannot attract top level talent, how in the world did we get Suarez then?

I'm going to go out on a limb and say any British player not from Manchester or London signing for Liverpool is not likely to leave to play for a rival of ours. Sure, they might go to Newcastle or Villa, but if they did it would be because they weren't good enough for us first. I'm not expecting these people to be like Gerrard or Carra, but I am expecting them to leave LFC only because the manager wanted someone better.

The points about the players Benitez and Houllier bought also flounder in the wake that, while they were very good players when they were here, hardly any of them are still at the club. Only Reina and Kuyt remain of the "good" Rafa contingent - the rest have moved on, aren't really good enough, or are more or less permanently broken. This lack of continuity is one of the reasons why he have such a weak squad.

Which is why I said maybe we'll have a weaker, more expensive squad by buying British players at a time when their prices are massively inflated, but in 3 years time hopefully most of those players will be signing new contracts rather than the club needing to find replacements (and if we're finding replacements it's most likely because things didn't work out for them [eg Joe Cole], not because the player couldn't cut it in the EPL/England [eg Jovanovic]). We spend now so that we don't have to spend AGAIN later as well as running a lesser risk of high profile failures.

Fair point, but there was some doubt whether Suarez was 'top level' before he joined

His record in Holland was superb - but you could say that about keezman and hunterlar, both of whom flopped as soon as they left the Ditch league

He was obviously good - but I for one never had any idea he was that good - if what we've seen so far is anything to go by

He moght have only be here half a season (even less) but he's been our best player this season by a ciuntry mile