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Joined: Mar 2016
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1st Team Squad
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[quote=Hercules/AF 58][quote=sixtiesred] Klopp must have seen something in the Ox to want him, one thing Klopp is very good at is spotting a player and developing them into the way he wants them to play in his system. He also gives an option if Mane or Salah are not available with his pace, I think he's a good squad player and is good quality to bring in if we lose a Mane or Salah, something we have not had in recent years, as we saw last January. We had the £35 million available for/towards a CB whether we signed Ox or not, the problem is Klopp could only find a CB in VvD that we could not sign as he was not available, we had the £70+ million ready if Southampton released him, so we did not need to save any money for a CB, we also sold Sakho for £27 million, so that money would have covered the money spent on Ox. I thought we already had Coutinho and Laĺlana who could play as wingers as well as Salah and Mane. Maybe we won't need too much input from defenders given the number of goals we will be scoring Lallana and Coutinho are very good players, but I would not call them wingers, they don't have the pace of Mane or Salah and take far too many touches to 'stretch' teams or get behind them, Ox can. I think Klopp wants to improve the defence, but he could not get the players he wanted to do that, so he will work with what he has, with TAA & Gomes starting well and bringing in Robertson, he has more options, we defend as a team, we don't really have specialist DM etc, so it's tuning the system, if we can keep the CB's fit we will be ok imo, but that's a big 'if'.
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Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 22,926
Liverpool Legend
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Liverpool Legend
Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 22,926 |
[quote=Hercules/AF 58][quote=sixtiesred] Klopp must have seen something in the Ox to want him, one thing Klopp is very good at is spotting a player and developing them into the way he wants them to play in his system. He also gives an option if Mane or Salah are not available with his pace, I think he's a good squad player and is good quality to bring in if we lose a Mane or Salah, something we have not had in recent years, as we saw last January. We had the £35 million available for/towards a CB whether we signed Ox or not, the problem is Klopp could only find a CB in VvD that we could not sign as he was not available, we had the £70+ million ready if Southampton released him, so we did not need to save any money for a CB, we also sold Sakho for £27 million, so that money would have covered the money spent on Ox. I thought we already had Coutinho and Laĺlana who could play as wingers as well as Salah and Mane. Maybe we won't need too much input from defenders given the number of goals we will be scoring Lallana and Coutinho are very good players, but I would not call them wingers, they don't have the pace of Mane or Salah and take far too many touches to 'stretch' teams or get behind them, Ox can. I think Klopp wants to improve the defence, but he could not get the players he wanted to do that, so he will work with what he has, with TAA & Gomes starting well and bringing in Robertson, he has more options, we defend as a team, we don't really have specialist DM etc, so it's tuning the system, if we can keep the CB's fit we will be ok imo, but that's a big 'if'. Both Coutinho and Laĺlana have been playing wingers for us, especially Coutinho who has never played elsewhere. He will probably now be tried in the middle where in fact AOC also wants to play. Thus I think we needed a central defender more than AOC and for sure our 2 main central defenders won't stay fit
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Joined: Aug 2011
Posts: 8,564
1st Team Squad
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1st Team Squad
Joined: Aug 2011
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Of all the players we went in for, they all wanted us. The only real failure is Van Djik, but all in all I think we look a lot stronger.
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Joined: Mar 2016
Posts: 6,054
1st Team Squad
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1st Team Squad
Joined: Mar 2016
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Of all the players we went in for, they all wanted us. The only real failure is Van Djik, but all in all I think we look a lot stronger. Just a real shame we couldn't land VvD, would have really set us up. You never know, Lovren might up his game now as it was so blatant we wanted VvD, abit like how Migs reacted to Karius arriving, he needs to convince Klopp he should be kept.
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Joined: Mar 2016
Posts: 6,054
1st Team Squad
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1st Team Squad
Joined: Mar 2016
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[quote=ecnirp98][quote=TiredReds][quote=Hercules/AF 58][quote=sixtiesred]
I thought we already had Coutinho and Laĺlana who could play as wingers as well as Salah and Mane. Maybe we won't need too much input from defenders given the number of goals we will be scoring Lallana and Coutinho are very good players, but I would not call them wingers, they don't have the pace of Mane or Salah and take far too many touches to 'stretch' teams or get behind them, Ox can. I think Klopp wants to improve the defence, but he could not get the players he wanted to do that, so he will work with what he has, with TAA & Gomes starting well and bringing in Robertson, he has more options, we defend as a team, we don't really have specialist DM etc, so it's tuning the system, if we can keep the CB's fit we will be ok imo, but that's a big 'if'. Both Coutinho and Laĺlana have been playing wingers for us, especially Coutinho who has never played elsewhere. He will probably now be tried in the middle where in fact AOC also wants to play. Thus I think we needed a central defender more than AOC and for sure our 2 main central defenders won't stay fit Totally agree we need a CB, my point is buying AOC did not affect our chances of landing a CB, and AOC does improve our squad, even if we did overpay abit imo, but who didn't overpay this Window. Lallana and Coutinho are different types of players to Mane & Salah, so we miss their pace if we lose them, as we saw last season when Mane was injured/ANC and it forced us to change how we play, hopefully AOC can deliver some pace if they are out, it's going to be a battle for places in MF, so hopefully they will all up their game, we haven't had that competition for places in MF for a while, so it's all good.
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Joined: Jan 2010
Posts: 22,926
Liverpool Legend
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Liverpool Legend
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Of all the players we went in for, they all wanted us. The only real failure is Van Djik, but all in all I think we look a lot stronger. Of course we are stronger as we didn't lost any first team player and we have reinforced a few positions. However, we haven't reinforced what look to be our weakest spot, ie central defence. However, maybe it has to do more with our system than individual players.
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Joined: Sep 2011
Posts: 7,291
1st Team Squad
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1st Team Squad
Joined: Sep 2011
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You never know, Lovren might up his game now as it was so blatant we wanted VvD, abit like how Migs reacted to Karius arriving, he needs to convince Klopp he should be kept.
Lovren signed a new long-term contract not so long ago so even if or when we do sign a better defender I can't see him leaving, otherwise what was the point in the new contract!
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Joined: Mar 2016
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1st Team Squad
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1st Team Squad
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You never know, Lovren might up his game now as it was so blatant we wanted VvD, abit like how Migs reacted to Karius arriving, he needs to convince Klopp he should be kept.
Lovren signed a new long-term contract not so long ago so even if or when we do sign a better defender I can't see him leaving, otherwise what was the point in the new contract! Contracts are fairly worthless now, they just hold the players value and you can force an unhappy player to stay, like we have with Coutinho, who thinks Coutinho will see out his 5 years? most people see Matip as our no.1 CB, then Lovren, then Klavan & Gomes, so I expect that if we signed VvD he would partner Matip, as the end of the day, Klopp chose Matip, he didn't sign Lovren, so Lovren is most at risk in the first team IMO. I still think Lovren would be kept as third choice CB cover and for rotation, I didn't mean he would be sold. Who would you play at CB if we signed VvD?
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Joined: Sep 2011
Posts: 7,291
1st Team Squad
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1st Team Squad
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Who would you play at CB if we signed VvD?
Obviously Matip and Van Dijk, I'm very vocal about how poor I think Lovren is but Klopp sees him as part of the future otherwise there was no need for the new contract.
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Joined: Mar 2016
Posts: 6,054
1st Team Squad
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1st Team Squad
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Who would you play at CB if we signed VvD?
Obviously Matip and Van Dijk, I'm very vocal about how poor I think Lovren is but Klopp sees him as part of the future otherwise there was no need for the new contract. The new contract was abit odd, there were no other clubs being linked with him and he had around 2.5 years left on his contract, he signed it in April, which was just before the news of the VvD interest/chats broke, so I think he may have wanted Lovren signed up before he went for VvD as he suspected Lovren would not be happy, so having him on a 5 year deal gave us more control.
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