Sorry to remind you these sad memories, but imo there's something far deeper than sportive choices or financial questions, that probably made many international players, sponsors, medias, and even the FA and its referees prefer to chose/favor other clubs. Being associated with the feast of football turning into tragedies in people minds. It took some years to start to impact the results, but the turning point was 1985 (and as undeserved it was it only got worse after 1989, thanks the s*n and all that crap). When big sponsor and new kind of owners money started to flood the league in the nineties LFC had the worst possible image to attract them, no mystery why they decided to rather bet on rivals. Out of its supporters, everyone in football (and more in politics and medias) wanted LFC to be forgotten with the excesses of the previous decade, how many players were turned off or negatively affected by that ambiance ? There were some pure football matters too of course, like everything Souness, and (far later) the ownership problems, but imo they weren't the root of the decline. It was probably unavoidable considering that context.
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