The walters step over

Nothing will be learnt. They keep on making the same mistakes again and again. Moreno has cost us goals in the same ways since he got here, Mignolet isn't consistent enough to play for a team that wants to challenge. Henderson, Allen and Lucas will not get any more creative or threatening around the box and Lallana needs to be in a team that is playing well to look effective. No matter how good Klopp is the fact remains that in a lot of our players it just isn't in them. There's a lot of work that needs doing in the summer.

I would imagine that BR has been told that this season will be his last if we don't look like we can compete regularly under his management - It looks as though he's decided that if he's going down then it'll be with the players HE wanted at the club.

This content is not viewable to guests.,This content is not viewable to guests.

There's part of me that thinks that it's pathetically obvious how this is all going to end up.

Moneyball works (to a point) in baseball because it's really an individual game. You can be pretty certain that if a player has a high batting average over the last 5 years at one team there's no real reason why he won't be able to do exactly the same at a new one. Football is the ultimate team game, statistics mean next to nothing when it comes to evaluating players or teams - that FSG still haven't seemed to work that out yet is a bit concerning.

By that logic, it was completely down to FSG that we came so close last year. I'm not saying the Sun shines out of their ar*es but they HAVE given managers money to spend - it's mostly been wasted but even though you've had hundreds of posts saying the same thing (something about you don't like the owners, I'm not really sure, you haven't been clear..) you haven't once given a credible alternative. Unless there's a billionare that fancies having us as a plaything/status symbol what do you expect? If we can't afford to pay wages at the level of City, United etc then we have to do it another way. There's a hell of a lot of examples of teams that have gambled their futures for short term success, I can think of quite a few that have gone t*** up but I honestly can't think of a single one that has taken that gamble and it's paid off. Name one person or company that you want to take over. And what levels of investment you expect to be made in terms of player wages and transfer fees.

This content is not viewable to guests.,This content is not viewable to guests.

This content is not viewable to guests.,This content is not viewable to guests.

OK. It's not a factor then. When the like of Mascherano, Tevez have given interviewas about how "there's nothing to do" when living in the North, or when various "x's girlfriend only wants to live in London/doesn't like living in Manchester,Liverpool" reports, these are all baseless lies. No players have ever refused to join Utd or City and any that decide not to come to us is entirely FSG or Ayres fault.

It does, and has done plenty of times. A load of players have turned them down. Off the top of my head - Kaka, Fabregas, Ronaldinho, Ronaldo, Robben, Zidane and plenty of others over the years even when they were winning everything. It's been said so many times by so many players (and their wives/girlfriends - De Geas missus just the other week for example) that the only place they want to live in in the UK is London that it can't just be dismissed as though it isn't a huge factor.

Thing with Origi though is that he knows he's leaving, most players interest dips when they know they're off in a couple of months. If we don't get CL then imo I can't see us signing any "big name" established players - we can't pay the huge wages needed, it'll be three or four could be good/may just be average younger types.

It'd be interesting to know how Ayre tries to sell "performance linked pay" to prospective signings. Personally, I think it'd be easy enough for an agent to say to his player "they don't believe in you - x have offered twenty grand a week more, go there instead." If we lose Henderson and Sterling because we're trying to be clever then we might as well just fecking give up.

Or we could just win the Europa league and watch Van Gaals head explode when we're put in the CL instead of them..

Agents don't seem to care about the development of their players. Look at the young(ish) players that join Chelsea or City, everyone knows those clubs aren't going to allow players to develop and learn from their mistakes, they will just go out and spend millions on the finished article but year after year the likes of Salah,,Rodwell,Jovetic etc,etc move to these clubs because the agents are after short term gain. Trying to appeal to players and agents sense of loyalty and common sense is a completely f*cking naive strategy on the clubs part and it looks as though Gerrard is trying to light a fire under their arses to get these contracts sorted. For what it's worth, I'd say Henderson will certainly sign, with Raheem, I think that unless we give him a Suarez type deal I can see him moving to Madrid, failing, then back at Chelsea or Utd within 2 years.

It's happened under every owner we've ever had, I don't think we FSG can be blamed for us missing out on Charlie Nicholas, Roy Keane,Dessailly,etc,etc. It's not really that difficult, he had a choice whereby he could either go and live in London and play for a team that plays in the CL every year or go to one that has qualified once in the last 5 years and just lost their best player.

It's weird how people still can't get their heads around the fact that a player we wanted didn't want to join us, as though it's never happened before.

Yep, criticism comes with the territory when you're at a major club - he's actually had a pretty easy ride if you compare what would've been said about him had he been at UTd, Barca or wherever. The idea that losing two players means he can't have his decisions scrutinized is fantasy land. We've been horrific in the transfer market and laughable in defence - I don't think it's extreme or unfair to point that out, especially when he comes out again and basically says "what can I do ?Not my fault" when asked about our defence.

Surely the more important point is that he saw how Mignolet performed last year and still decided to get rid of Reina and not bring in a replacement.

Utter balls.

Their original plan was for Van Gaal to be a mentor to a younger manager. Rodgers has come out several times and said that he told FSG that he didn't want anyone above him and he wouldn't sign unless they agreed to his demands.

And if there isn't anyone around that fancies spending a few hundred million on trying to get some reflected glory then what?

Not for a long time yet. When he came out and stated how happy he is with the players we bought he was obviously lying (for some reason) and it's FSG's fault our performance has gone backwards - that's the narrative a lot of people want to push. The new one that's started is the "The Americans sold Suarez and kept the money" - no evidence, no examples to fall back on just "I bet..". Maybe it is simply that a lot of foreign players don't want to live in the North of the country (if Man Utd couldn't attract top class talent last Summer, along with being turned down over the years by the likes of Ronaldinho etc and City were turned down by quite a few when they first won the lottery then maybe it is as large a factor as many refuse to admit) then what can we do? It's alright saying "just pay them whatever" but then the whole squad is knocking on the door asking for pay bumps, if we can't afford it, then we can't afford it. It was always going to be this way and the only thing we can do is wait and hope that a decent number of the players brought in come close to fulfilling their potential.

Normally, I'd agree with the bit in bold because usually clubs in CL get to bring in players from a higher level than they could normally afford/attract . However last year we were probably the most exciting team in Europe, with a guaranteed CL place and money to burn and we spent it on players we could have bought last year for a Hell of a lot less. If we couldn't bring in top quality this Summer then I don't think where we finish this year will have any bearing on who we can bring in during next years transfer window.

The opposition hadn't got to grips with Gerrards role then, they have now. We've played well in one game this season, and it's not a coincidence that was against a team that didn't have a man standing on Gerrard for the entire game - add in we had the two best strikers in the Prem playing and in form then I think it's too dangerous and simplistic just to say "do the same thing as last year", we have been trying to do that and we've been poor in almost every game.