Mate, if Liverpool have no intentions of finding a like-for-like replacement for Luis Suarez, does that not tell you that we wanted to sell him regardless of whether he wanted to stay or not? The fee was significant, and negotiations were seemingly smooth. If we had desperately wanted him to stay, surely then our priority would have been to try and keep him (which we didn't), or find someone who could replace him (which we haven't).
Rodgers knew the quality of Suarez but he also knew the long term importance of adding quality depth to this squad (which personally I feel would have been impossible without the LS departure). I think he was happy to sacrifice that world class forward for a better balanced squad - and that's what he gone and done. By no means do I have anything against this vision of his. If it wins us the title then I'm all for it! .. but in response to your last sentence, no - I do not think it'll be the player/s we were all expecting. Someone who can step in for Sturridge is what I'm expecting.
I actually thought he was going to go before the WC thing, seems negotiations with Barcelona (or their interest was known) were going on before his ban, plenty of time to look around in case it happened.
I'd rather we made the whole team stronger than blowing it all on two superstar players or whatever.
It's one of them, I don't think there is any replacement for Suarez, I never expected that, just some added quality up front would suffice.
All in all I think we've got some real talent but I'm still surprised about the striker conundrum, it should have been planned out better. Maybe, strikers can mess around and ask for more because they always have, because they score the goals.
You say the sacrifice in trade for a stronger team, I agree with that philosophy.
It was to highly pivoted on one player and whether he'd get banned or whatever.
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