I think Can, Hendo, Lucas, Allen could handle mid-field duties as well as bringing Tex in to cover in cup matches.
I half agree with you mate. Can is going to be a beast and become our key man over the next couple of years IMO. Hendo, if he finds consistency and doesn't buckle under the pressure of being captain could be a key asset too but in terms of being able to grab a game by the scruff of it's neck and get us the killer pass or game changing moment, I'm not sure any of them will be able to. Lucas is a defensive player, he's boss at what he does but Allen is a nothing player IMO; he isn't particuarly good at defending, his passing isn't going to carve through a defence and he isn't going to find the net when we need him to either. He played well for a few games but against Swansea when he was being raved about by a fair few people as man of the match etc, I still didn't expect him to deliver against one of the competing teams around our end of the table and it was evident that he was lost against the Mancs, he was dominated and they were targeting him. He's a good player to add depth but he isn't going to win you a trophy. I have left out Tex on the basis that we don't really know how he will do as of yet.
We need to ship out a few bits of dead wood and get in another top quality striker that can get us goals on a regular basis, something only Sturridge can do at the moment. We need somebody in midfield that will be as effective as Gerrard was a few years ago and we need to strengthen at the back (in terms of Full Backs/Wing Backs) and in goal.
At the moment we have a lot of squad players IMO and no real spine to the team. If you look back a few years we had the lot; we had Pepe, Carra, Gerrard and Torres as the main spine of the team, with the like of Hyypia, Alonso, Masch and Kuyt all being deemed vital.
Last season we had the most lethal attack in the league with SAS.
This season I'm not sure what we could class as the spine that is full of quality. Sure we have Migs, Skrtel, Hendo, Coutinho and Sturridge but the Migs and Skrtel side of things worries me that they aren't a real spine, they are just better than what we could replace them in the starting line up with.
Potential wise we are right up there, we have Sakho, Moreno, Sterling, Ibe, Can and Markovic etc but at the moment they are still a fair way off being top class. You look at the team and think "Yeah, pretty much every team in the league would want Coutinho and Sturridge" but other than them I don't think we have anyone at this stage that could walk into basically any team in the world.
This summer it's vital that the owners provide money again and it's vital we get better results out of the resulting signings. It's time to start signing some established, top class players that will not only be of benefit to the strength of the team but also of benefit to helping the likes of Can, Sterling, Ibe, Markovic etc develop their game without the pressure of having the look of our key man already and the player we look to in order to get us out the sh*t.