I offered Lucas for £40M in the last day of the transfer window to see if anyone would be crazy enough to offer that much and Real Madrid did! A big part of the fee is going to be paid in 48 installments, but it was such crazy money, I sold him straight away.
Bought Lars Bender as his replacement for around £20M.
In the end, my transfer activity went as follows:
Signed: Benteke, Diamé, Pepe (on loan from Juventus), Lars Bender and a young DM from Lazio whose name I forgot for a low fee and a loan back for the remainder of the season.
Sold: Lucas Leiva.
I'm doing well so far, conceding many goals, rarely keeping a clean sheet, but scoring even more.
My lineup looks like this:
Mignolet (SK)
Skrtel (BPD) -
Sakho (BPD)
Johnson (CWB) -
Bender (HB) -
Enrique (CWB)
Gerrard (BBM) -
Henderson (AP)
Suarez (AP)
Benteke (FN) -
Sturridge (P)
SK = sweeper keeper.
BPD = ball playing defender.
CWB = complete wing back.
HB = half back.
BBM = box to box midfielder.
AP = advanced playmaker.
FN = false nine.
P = poacher.
Agger is arguably my best defender but Sakho has performed better of late, he's a goal machine from corners!
Bender as a half back means he's playing almost as a 3rd CB, so it doesn't leave me as exposed as it may look. It really is a very offensive tactic though.
Enrique is a beast in this position, won the player of the month award for September.
Gerrard is bloody awful so far, his average rating is something like 6.35... Playing Diame or Allen more often is under consideration.
Henderson is much better than I expected. Did well even when I played him as a defensive winger on the left.
Suarez, Benteke and Sturridge are fantastic together.
In a game when Gerrard, Diamé and Allen were all injured, I did something crazy and gave Jordan Rossiter a start as half back, pushing Bender to the box-to-box position. I won the game 3-2 against Villa and Rossiter became the youngest LFC player ever! Pretty cool