Brendan Rodgers transfer market dealings, good or bad?

 

Fabio Borini  Roma  £10,400,000  13 July 2012 
Joe Allen  Swansea  £15,000,000  10 August 2012 
Oussama Assaidi  Heerenveen  £2,400,000  17 August 2012 
Nuri Sahin  Real Madrid  Loan  25 August 2012 
Samed Yesil  Bayer Leverkusen  £1,000,000  30 August 2012 
Daniel Sturridge  Chelsea  £12,000,000  2 January 2013 
Philippe Coutinho  Inter Milan  £8,600,000  30 January 2013 
Luis Alberto  Sevilla  £6,800,000  22 June 2013 
Iago Aspas  Celta Vigo  £7,500,000  23 June 2013 
Simon Mignolet  Sunderland  £10,000,000  25 June 2013 
Kolo Toure  Man City  Free  2 July 2013 
Aly Cissokho  Valencia  Loan  20 August 2013 
Tiago Ilori  Sporting CP  £7,000,000  2 September 2013 
Mamadou Sakho  PSG  £15,000,000  2 September 2013 
Victor Moses  Chelsea  Loan  2 September 2013

 
 I've seen Brendans transfer dealings mentioned a couple of times with some people going as far as to suggest that there's "no wonder" FSG aren't backing him more as he's wasted lots of money. Given that, I thought it might be time to look in detail at how he's performed. Now, none of us know for sure what transfer fees have been paid, but these are from Wikipedia (I know) and they seem sensible. I know Brendan has said before that the actual fee we paid for Llori was "nowhere near" 7 million, but I've left it in anyway. The loan fee for Sahin was a few mill anyway so that'll copmpensate for any irregularities, similarly I thought we'd paid 9 for Mignolet and not 10, but anyway.

 By my reckoning, those fees add up to around 95 million quid, give or take a sheckle or two. Now we got around 6 or so for Shelvey, 16 or so for Carroll, so not taking into account wages and the like it looks like we're in for around 73 million quid. How much did we get for our cash, how much would they be worth if we flogged the lot off tomorrow, etc etc.


 
 

Fabio Borini (10.4 mill)- A strange signing and not the best of starts for Brendan who obviously thought Fabio would be a hit. Didn't really settle, but is now showing at Sunderland that he is at least a fairly decent player. Has already said he wants to come back to Liverpool to fight for his place, and I think we'll get a good honest player out of it. My guess is if we sold him on the open market (to Sunderland for instance) he is probably worth around 7 million quid and rising. Not perfect, but better than it looked a few months back. (resale value 7 mill)
 
Joe Allen (15mill)- Has polarised opinion since his arrival, with patches of excellence surrounded by periods of mediocrity. Clearly is a good footballer, but the question remains about what is his best position in the midfield. Probably not combative enough to play the Lucas role, and possibly not creative enough to play the Henderson one. I personally like him a lot and suspect someone would get a bargain if we sold him on the open market, my guess is we'd get around half of what we paid for him. I do though have a strong feeling that in time he will be an excellent player, once he works out what he is. (resale value 7.5 mill)
 
Oussama Assaidi  (2.4 mill)- A strange one as he always looked like he had ability, even when he couldn't get into the team. At Stoke he has blossomed, but the suspicion remains that that my be more his level than a big club like Liverpool. FSG would like this signing though, as we would undoubtedly make a profit on him if we sold him tomorrow. (resale value 6.5 mill, possibly more if a couple of teams got involved).
 
Nuri Sahin- Never worked out although was obviously uber talented. It did appear that the Premiership wasn't to his liking, but on a personal note I wish we'd have given him longer to find his feet.
   
Samed Yesil (1 mill)- Has been very unlucky with injuries but the reports are that he has some ability. I know nothing about him though so am going to put his resale value at zero.

Daniel Sturridge (12 mill)- An absolute revelation since his signing, surely the best out and out striker England has. Looks to me like he will always be injury prone, but also looks like he'll score every time he plays. As natural a finisher as you'll ever see and pacey with it, he's disproven all the concerns about his attitude. The manager thinks he will get better and I agree, and if we resold him tomorrow we would make a big profit, particularly given his age. Much depends upon who would come in for him, but IMHO he'd get in every team in the Premiership bar Man City, and even then I'm not sure about that. (Resale value 32 mill, minimum).
   
Philippe Coutinho  (8.6 mill)- A wonderful little player who is suffering from "second season" syndrome at the moment. He'll come back though as he's only a kid, and again if we sold him on we'd make a very big profit. (Resale value 18 mill minimum).
 
Luis Alberto (6.8 mill)- Very early but at this stage we can be sure that he is a talented footballer. Unfortunately we can equally be sure that for whatever reason the manager doesn't think he's up to it at least for now. He looks very slow to me which is rare for one so young, and I'm personally not convinced he will ever make it with us. My guess is he'll be on his was back to Spain for around a third of what we paid for him before long. (resale value 2.5 mill).
 
Iago Aspas (7.5 mill)- Another odd signing. I must confess I didn't rate him at first sight and I've seen nothing as time goes on to convince me that I was wrong. Not strong enough, not quick enough and not good enough for the Premiership I'm afraid, and his age gives him a negligible resale value.
 
Simon Mignolet (10 mill)-Quality yong keeper who has made a couple of bloopers recently. Needs to improve certain aspects of his game but I think he will and go onto become our keeper for many years. I think he's as good as anything else in the Premiership and that we stole him personally, but we probably wouldn't get his worth if we sold him tomorrow. (Resale value 12 mill).

Kolo Toure (Free)- A really astute pick-up, as valuable for what he brings to the squad behind the scenes as he is for what he brings on the pitch. Can't give him resale value, although he is a valuable player.

Aly Cissokho (loan)- Jesus Christ.

Tiago Ilori (7 mill)-International man of mystery. Must be absolutely awful as he is a left footed defender and he can't get a game in front of Cissoko. Can only assume he isn't worth a carrot.

Mamadou Sakho (15 mill)-I really like this lad. A future captain if ever I've seen one, could end up being worth double what we paid for him. As it is has shown enough to be worth a bit more than our purchase price. (resale value 18 mill).
 
Victor Moses (loan)-A good player IMHO but one who clearly doesn't want to be at the club. God knows why he signed in the first place, and why we signed him in the first place.



 Now I think I've been fairly conservative with the valuations I'd put on our players. By my mental maths, I reckon we'd get around 113.5 mill if we sold them all on tomorrow. I would expect Mignolet, Sakho, Allen and Coutinho to increase their value over the next 18 months, and there's a chance Borini and Assaidi will too. All in all Brendan ain't done bad in my view.

God that's a depressing list. Sturridge has been an inspired buy, and Coutinho has looked decent - at that price especially.

Bit early to tell about Sakho as he hasn't palyed much and his form has been inconsistent.

Mignolet looks very overpriced at £10m and if he doesn't improve his distribution, catching, kicking and communication we will need a new keeper, because being a good shot-stopper isn't enough at this level.

The rest have been utterly F***ing useless and I'd get rid of all of them.

Take out the loan players and the list doesn't look so bad. Apart from Aspas the rest of the purchases are decent to very good players. A few like Ilori, Yesil and Alberto bought for the future so too early to judge. One thing is for sure Rodgers is making very poor loan player decisions.

My own view is you don't judge the success or failure of players by their resale value but by their value to the team.

For me there are only two stand out players who have really improved the team (Coutinho and Sturridge). Mignolet  while looking as if he will be an excellent keeper hasn't improved the team discernably from Reina so far. Sakho again looks like he will eventually prove to be a top class player but sadly we haven't seen enough yet due to injuries.

Toure, Allen and Alberto are probably the best of the rest, but haven't really shown they can hold down a place in the team or that they are much better than squad players.   

The rest for me are at best squad fillers and I wouldn't lose too much sleep if they were sold tomorrow. In fact if we could get what we paid for them and have another go at bringing in other players I would be delighted.

So my view is Brendan has almost a 50% success rate , not too bad, but could have done a hell of a lot better. Too many players bought with an eye on the future and resale value and not enough bought for what they can bring to the team immediately.

I wouldn't expect to see Brendan sacked because of his average buying so far, but he really needs to start bringing in more players that improve us rather than players that may fill the benches but can't be trusted to play.



 

Sturridge and Coutinho are the only ones that stand out to me on that list.

Too early to say on Sakho, Alberto (when he gets a game) and Mignolet hopefully they turn out decent.

Then the rest are depressing, fair play to Borini and Assaidi who are having playiing great with Sunderland and Stoke.

Again, depressing.

The great signings are Mignolet, Sturridge, Sakho and Coutinhio. The rest are decent signings with the exception of Aspas who is not good enough.

There is certainly a lot for the future in that list and it could be very very good.

Now I think I've been fairly conservative with the valuations I'd put on our players. By my mental maths, I reckon we'd get around 113.5 mill if we sold them all on tomorrow. I would expect Mignolet, Sakho, Allen and Coutinho to increase their value over the next 18 months, and there's a chance Borini and Assaidi will too. All in all Brendan ain't done bad in my view.

You're a poster who often writes great sense, Mick, but when it comes to Brendan Rodgers you are not very objective.

Your hypothetical "we'd get this back for them" doesn't really matter to the ordinary Liverpool fan who wants to see his/her club progress back into the Champions League and is looking at the majority of players Rodgers has bought and can see clearly bar two or three, they aren't helping us get top 4.  If Woy had got back for Konchesky what he paid for him, does that  make it okay  the time wasted on a sh*t player and its detrimental effect on our team's progression?

It is the players left over from Benitez and Dalglish that are pushing us on to get 4th - Skrtel, Johnson, Lucas, Henderson, Gerrard, Suarez, Sterling - they're the ones in the team most weeks. And you can include Enrique and maybe Agger when they return. So Rodgers has spent a lot on players that in the main aren't really an improvement on the players like Reina, Shelvey and Downing that he sold. 

Without accountability in any organization, chaos reigns. So let's not try to hide average or poor signings by the manager by playing the accountant's game of magic numbers.

Fabio Borini  Roma  £10,400,000  13 July 2012   - Looks like this one may work out after all
Joe Allen  Swansea  £15,000,000  10 August 2012   - Looked good, got injured, looked bad, got healthy, started to look good, got injured again....jury still out
Oussama Assaidi  Heerenveen  £2,400,000  17 August 2012  - Not so good, was this Brendan's decision?
Nuri Sahin  Real Madrid  Loan  25 August 2012  - Completely baffled on this one...why?
Samed Yesil  Bayer Leverkusen  £1,000,000  30 August 2012  - looked to be a good pickup but can't stay healthy, not Brendan's fault
Daniel Sturridge  Chelsea  £12,000,000  2 January 2013  - Great signing
Philippe Coutinho  Inter Milan  £8,600,000  30 January 2013  - Great signing
Luis Alberto  Sevilla  £6,800,000  22 June 2013  - too early to tell, looks a good one for the future
Iago Aspas  Celta Vigo  £7,500,000  23 June 2013 - not looking so good
Simon Mignolet  Sunderland  £10,000,000  25 June 2013  - Good signing
Kolo Toure  Man City  Free  2 July 2013  - Good signing
Aly Cissokho  Valencia  Loan  20 August 2013  - Brendan must have been drunk 
Tiago Ilori  Sporting CP  £7,000,000  2 September 2013  - One for the future, potential is there
Mamadou Sakho  PSG  £15,000,000  2 September 2013  - Good (potential to be great) signing depending on health
Victor Moses  Chelsea  Loan  2 September 2013 - Brendan got fooled on this one, down to the player not giving a crap me thinks

It depends on how you perceive it. Are you aiming for long term success or short term success?

Ilori and Alberto were clearly bought for the future, so we'll have to see whether they are moulded into the player Rodgers desires. Personally I feel for a club like us, it's better to establish ourselves as top-four contenders so I would look to improve the foundation, and then focus on long term investments.

Disappointed with the transfers of Allen, borini and aspas, although I feel Borini could come good at Liverpool. Is he Liverpool material? I don't know. As for Aspas, I feel he was a complete waste of money. Incredibly light weight and a strange transfer. We ought to spend more wisely, and focus on purchasing players who will immediately impact the club.

Sturridge is undoubtedly our best signing under Rodgers. Coutinho and Sakho are two other decent purchases for this club, although this season has witnessed a significant decrease in coutinhos form.

Our loan signings have been despicable and if I could, I would urge Rodgers to keep away from them. We are lfc - we should not need to loan in players.

What happens to Alberto when Suso returns from loan? What happens to Aspas when Borini returns? Will Ilori even get a look in any time soon? Do we keep Suso out on loan and help him develop further? Do we do the same with Alberto?

Our best players are Suarez (Dalglish), Sturridge (Rodgers), Henderson (Dalglish), Sterling (youth/Benitez), Lucas (Benitez), Skrtel (Benitez), Enrique (Dalglish).

Jury is still out on Coutinho and Sakho. So far so good, but Coutinhos form seems to be dipping for whatever reason. Probably trying too hard to impress. He had a fantastic half season last year.

Mick your positivity defines you and at times refreshing on here.

Without starting a sh*t storm with the usual suspects crawling out of their holes at me .... I have to say that the majority of the buys are "less than impressive".

Sturridge  Coutinho and Mignolet. Yes.

I cant go further than those three and cant waste the words on the rest. Sorry Mick .

At least we are not bringing in Rafa's scary number of transfers .

Mick your positivity defines you and at times refreshing on here.

Without starting a sh*t storm with the usual suspects crawling out of their holes at me .... I have to say that the majority of the buys are "less than impressive".

Sturridge  Coutinho and Mignolet. Yes.

I cant go further than those three and cant waste the words on the rest. Sorry Mick .

At least we are not bringing in Rafa's scary number of transfers .

I think Sakho will soon prove he should be included in that group.

My own view is you don't judge the success or failure of players by their resale value but by their value to the team.

For me there are only two stand out players who have really improved the team (Coutinho and Sturridge). Mignolet  while looking as if he will be an excellent keeper hasn't improved the team discernably from Reina so far. Sakho again looks like he will eventually prove to be a top class player but sadly we haven't seen enough yet due to injuries.

Toure, Allen and Alberto are probably the best of the rest, but haven't really shown they can hold down a place in the team or that they are much better than squad players.   

The rest for me are at best squad fillers and I wouldn't lose too much sleep if they were sold tomorrow. In fact if we could get what we paid for them and have another go at bringing in other players I would be delighted.

So my view is Brendan has almost a 50% success rate , not too bad, but could have done a hell of a lot better. Too many players bought with an eye on the future and resale value and not enough bought for what they can bring to the team immediately.

I wouldn't expect to see Brendan sacked because of his average buying so far, but he really needs to start bringing in more players that improve us rather than players that may fill the benches but can't be trusted to play.



 

I'd agree with that too mate, I was just trying to demonstrate that those who are making the boss out to be useless in the market are way out of line. To me, Brendan's signings HAVE improved the team, and that's why we are gathering far more points now than we did before he arrived. When fit, I believe that Mignolet, Sakho, Allen, Coutinho and Sturridge would all get into our first choice eleven, and given the manager has been here 18 months I don't think that's a bad transformation.  God only knows what would have happened to us had he been able to buy Diego Costa, or Willian, or Salah, or Mikkiwhatsisface. As it is he's most of the time having to buy relative bargain basement purchases and given that, I think he's bought pretty well. The "resale value" is just an attempt to demonstrate it. I accept though that good signings make the team get better and that's obviously what all of us are interested in.

Plenty of buys but plenty of chaff

Bad ...and when we only have 15 players available and one of them is Moses and another one is Cissokho then its very bad indeed.If we lost Luis and Daniel for a few games we could tumble down the league and into turmoil.The club now has a Transfer Committee so its not really down to Brendan just as I would argue it was not down to Kenny.

I'd agree with that too mate, I was just trying to demonstrate that those who are making the boss out to be useless in the market are way out of line. To me, Brendan's signings HAVE improved the team, and that's why we are gathering far more points now than we did before he arrived. When fit, I believe that Mignolet, Sakho, Allen, Coutinho and Sturridge would all get into our first choice eleven, and given the manager has been here 18 months I don't think that's a bad transformation.  God only knows what would have happened to us had he been able to buy Diego Costa, or Willian, or Salah, or Mikkiwhatsisface. As it is he's most of the time having to buy relative bargain basement purchases and given that, I think he's bought pretty well. The "resale value" is just an attempt to demonstrate it. I accept though that good signings make the team get better and that's obviously what all of us are interested in.

My only real criticism of his buying is that for me he has tended to focus his buying on the wrong areas, buying players for the future for areas where we badly needed strengthening (midfield) , while spending big money on areas where perhaps we weren't in such urgent need of such strengthening. (Defence - where we have let in the same number of goals in the first 22 games as we did last season's first 22 games.... after spending most of our summer budget on defensive players)

As I said in another thread, he seems to be bargain buying rather than bringing in what we really need.

I think there has only really been Coutinho and Sturridge that have actually made a difference so far, Allen , Sakho and Mignolet while excellent players haven't improved the team by much if at all yet.... but I have no doubt they will given time.

Certainly if you look at the squad he was left and you look at the squad now Coutinho and Sturridge have been the difference.... that and the incredible form Suarez has shown this season.

Yet even with Suarez fantastic scoring we only gained the same points in the first 19 games this season as we did in the last 19 games of last season. So going by those simplistic facts one could argue that none of this summers signing have had any real impact.

Obviously things aren't so simplistic, but it does give one pause for thought. Has Mignolet been "that much better" than Reina, Sakho "that much better" than Agger ?

The rest of our summer signings being honest have had little or no impact at all (I am ignoring our loan players ).
   

Mignolet is far from what Reina was three years back. However Reina for us the last two years was as poor as I've ever seen him. Despite the mistakes Simon has made recently I still believe him, on balance, to be ahead of that Reina of the last couple of years. Although he cannot afford too many more mistakes if I am to continue to believe that. Sakho, however, is as imposing and dominant a defender we've had since Hyypia left. Do I believe he is better than Agger? Yes. Agger has shown leniency to the opposition in defence too often the past couple of years. The partnership of Skrtel and Agger was good, but not as good as some of us think it was. I think the leadership qualities of Carragher and Hyypia kept up that mirage/myth.

Mignolet is far from what Reina was three years back. However Reina for us the last two years was as poor as I've ever seen him. Despite the mistakes Simon has made recently I still believe him, on balance, to be ahead of that Reina of the last couple of years. Although he cannot afford too many more mistakes if I am to continue to believe that. Sakho, however, is as imposing and dominant a defender we've had since Hyypia left. Do I believe he is better than Agger? Yes. Agger has shown leniency to the opposition in defence too often the past couple of years. The partnership of Skrtel and Agger was good, but not as good as some of us think it was. I think the leadership qualities of Carragher and Hyypia kept up that mirage/myth.

If you had £27 million this summer would Reina and Agger have been your main priority to replace ?

I look at transfers like I would look at a night out, it doesn't matter what you spend as long as it was worth it.
Man City for example,  their night out consists of a slap up meal in a swanky restaurant,  washed down with expensive champagne,  followed by spending the rest of the night in an exclusive club in the VIP section! Their night out will prove very expensive,  but you can be sure that they will have enjoyed every minute of it.

Our night out on the other hand,  starts with a tray of hot wings from KFC, washed down with a bottle of Buckfast,  followed by sitting in the corner of our usual public house, drinking bad Guinness, hoping to get a ride at the end of the night.

I know which night would leave me feeling happier the next day !

I look at transfers like I would look at a night out, it doesn't matter what you spend as long as it was worth it.
Man City for example,  their night out consists of a slap up meal in a swanky restaurant,  washed down with expensive champagne,  followed by spending the rest of the night in an exclusive club in the VIP section! Their night out will prove very expensive,  but you can be sure that they will have enjoyed every minute of it.

Our night out on the other hand,  starts with a tray of hot wings from KFC, washed down with a bottle of Buckfast,  followed by sitting in the corner of our usual public house, drinking bad Guinness, hoping to get a ride at the end of the night.

I know which night would leave me feeling happier the next day !

I do love some KFC myself, tough one

Yet even with Suarez fantastic scoring we only gained the same points in the first 19 games this season as we did in the last 19 games of last season.

So going by those simplistic facts one could argue that none of this summers signing have had any real impact.

Obviously things aren't so simplistic, but it does give one pause for thought.
The rest of our summer signings being honest have had little or no impact at all (I am ignoring our loan players ).
   

Interesting stat there Saint.

Sometimes they are that simplistic.

I'd say weird.

I'm in BRs corner, and think he's done well / is doing well so far.

But on player signings, overall I couldn't say much more that they've been OK. Some strange ones, some have worked out well, and some where the jury is still out.

If I'd to pick the ones I could argue are "top4 squad" quality, from that list I'd only include 6 - Allen, Sturridge, Coutinho, Mignolet, Toure, Sahko - in that category. The other 9, for various reasons, I wouldn't.

Fabio Borini  - Flatters to deceive. Watched last 25 mins of the semi last night. Ran about, went off with a 'knock' - a lightweight.  Not up to the standard we need (on form so far)
Joe Allen  Swansea - Forms been up and down but there's a half season to go and I'd rather have him than not.
Oussama Assaidi - Scored a few goals for Stoke, but not seen enough of him in general play to have an opinion one way or the other.
Nuri Sahin  -  Not up to the standard we need (on form seen)
Samed Yesil  - Not seen enough of him
Daniel Sturridge - Saw something in him most didn't. Great signing.
Philippe Coutinho - Another really good signing.
Luis Alberto - Not up to the standard we need (on form so far)
Iago Aspas - Not up to the standard we need (on form so far)
Simon Mignolet  - Had some criticism but I think he's been a really good signing.
Kolo Toure - Good solid signing
Aly Cissokho - Not up to the standard we need (on form so far)
Tiago Ilori - Don't know, not seen him
Mamadou Sakho - Looks a really good signing, but need to get him out on the pitch more (hope he's not a Mr Glass, like Dagger)
Victor Moses -  Not up to the standard we need (on form so far)

Fabio Borini  - Flatters to deceive. Watched last 25 mins of the semi last night. Ran about, went off with a 'knock' - a lightweight.  Not up to the standard we need (on form so far)

Pity you didn't watch the first 85 minutes he was one of the best players on the pitch.