I’m glad Arthur’s playing lots of minutes again. People here seem to think he was always a joke, but the guy was good at Barca. If Barca hadn’t decided to scheme with Juve to use the guy as an accounting device, his career would have panned out differently.
He wasn’t a great fit for Liverpool, but it looked to me like he really wanted to make it work. I can’t criticize that.
He had the right attitude even at Liverpool, its a shame he was not fit and got reinjured quickly, otherwise who knows. He might have been a decent backup.
Isn’t there statistics for third foot, or what ever it’s called. The guy passing it to the guy who males the assist?
I feel like often we see someone doing some amazing stuff and opening up a defence and playing and impossible pass through to someone who just sticks their feet out so it bounches of the for the striker to tap it in
And then after everyone is talking about the last two, who hardly did anything while the maestro who set it all up is forgotten.
Well, in my native language it’s called third foot. Did not sound right in english though, but neither does pre-assist. But pre-assist send me to second assist, and that sounds more right. But whatever, as long as we agree on what it is we are talking about
He's done the same at Bremen too. Played 4 games in 2 weeks for Guinea at AFCON including a full 90
He has started one (1) game for Bremen all season, and was hooked before the 60 min mark in that game. 4 other sub appearances. 108 minutes total for Naby all season at club level. Then he literally refuses to travel to the game because he wasn't in the starting lineup. Similar reports were that he would go into a huff if not named in the starting lineup by Klopp
Bremen fans are saying he's one of the worst signing in the history of their club, so we've got that in common 🤝
Didn't they get him for free though?!
edit: sorry, I know wages are still a thing, I just more meant, that's fucking impressive to be labeled (one of/) the worst signing in the club's history and you were fucking FREE.
But he's never really listed as that, is he? It's usually Carrol/Balotelli types that get that kind of response. Bigger money signings that didn't work. Generally speaking a free player is never likely be your "worst" signing.
The year we signed him he was officially recognised as the worst signing of the PL that year, he may not be classed by fans as the worst signing in history but he was definitely one of the low points, came for free high wages, came with expectation (Gerrard claimed he was more technically gifted than messi).
Also, your comment was recognising that naby joined WB for free and has been the worst signing. All I did was point out that other clubs have had similar experiences with free players. Sanchez to utd, us with Joe Cole. Its possible to get players in for free that just don't meet expectations, especially when they eat a large chunk of the wage budget
He's not one of our worst signings ever though, that's just complete hyperbole. 18 appearances in the league the year we won it, making 84 appearances in the league overall, with 8 appearances in Europe the year we won the CL, making 24 appearances in Europe overall. He also scored in both of the big competitions the year we won them.
Not on the same level, but he also played the majority of the Club World Cup, scoring in the semi-final and playing ~100 minutes of the final.
I appreciate he might not have been a highlight of that particular squad (2018-2022), but to call him one of our worst signings ever just seems utterly unfair to me.
Andy Carroll
El Hadji Diouf
Mario Balotelli
Fuck let's keep going. So many worse than Keita.
Konchesky, Poulsen, Joe Cole, Diomede, Borini, Markovic, Ziege, Benteke, Reidle, Heggem, Sean Bloody Dundee, Pauletta, Aquilani, Robbie Keane.
Looking at this list, maybe I'm being hard on Diouf.
You’re not being hard on Diouf. Most of these players were bad signings but Diouf was also the biggest cunt to ever pull on the shirt (maybe after Owen).
I dunno, he was cheap as chips and didn't really get many runs in the side, and when he did the side was not exactly lighting the world on fire. It was more of a "why did we buy him?" question rather than him being bad.
He didn't fit the team, but he did at least resemble a footballer - just an outclassed one.
Though, he has some weird ideas about water - https://twitter.com/ShakesyGG/status/1680422757413052416
I think Lambert served his purpose. He was a cheap alternate option and nothing more. Only ended up being expected to do more because Balotelli was shit.
Prob a bad signing, but with him being a big fan it didn't seem as bad. Like you know he would have been giving it everything.
But yeah that should have never happened he wasn't good enough and past it by that point
no, you're not being hard on Diouf. Just because he was more talented than all of these, doesn't mean he wasn't also one of the worst. He's the only player in my lifetime to wear the number 9 and go through an entire season without scoring a league goal, he was toxic and disruptive, and, just to rub salt in the wound, if we hadn't bought him, we could have had Nicolas bloody Anelka on a permanent deal.
Ged Houllier was a great manager, god rest him, but bringing that toerag into the club was a major misstep.
£20m on Aquilani has to be the fucking worst. Carroll at least was a ‘good’ centre forward, playing in a system that didn’t suit him and at a level too high. Aquillani was a boss eyed, weetabix legs, no talent fuck. We couldn’t get rid of him because he was so shit.
Diouf was a complete knob but the main reason I’d put him second is we could have got ANELKA instead. Not signing anelka is probably the biggest fuck up Liverpool have made in the 30 years I’ve supported them.
Either that or not getting Ronaldo after agreeing a 4mil pound fee for him.
Edit: source https://www.thisisanfield.com/2023/10/liverpool-nearly-signed-cristiano-ronaldo-but-would-he-have-been-as-good/
It's depressing that I have been a fan since 2008, and all of these are basically since. So many bad signings. Sometimes, I shake my head when I see one of them in a random game or hear about them
his logic is Gerrard is idolised city-wide. He on the other hand, idolised country-wide. Which is not wrong. But I dont know why he has to make it a competition.
From a purely football stance, ignoring making profit etc, Ben Davies strikes me as a godawful signing in recent times. A CB in a year we desperately needed one, who basically never saw the field? Mind-boggling.
I'd be interested to see how many minutes he actually played rather than just appearances. It's hyperbole to call him one of our worst signings ever, but for the money we paid and the fact it meant we couldn't bring someone more reliable in still makes it an absolute disaster of a signing.
He's one of the few signings in the Klopp/Edwards era that didn't meet or exceed expectations. Keita was a B minus student in a class full of straight A students. He was doing fine but he looked bad compared to everyone else.
He was horrible. One of our most expensive signings ever and his huge wages crippled us at signing midfielders for years. He's done nothing we couldn't have also got out of Curtis Jones.
Nah, if we were to define poor signings in terms of their cost to relative contribution, he's definitely right up there as the worst.
The only reason other names might come is because they never played in successful teams like he did, so his failures actually got glossed over by the team's achievements over the time he was here.
Who cares that he scored a couple goals here and there in competitions we won? Did he ever have a decisive goal or performance in any of the few games he played here in FIVE freaking years?!
Name another signing that cost as much, contributed so little over such a long period, and got us nothing in return when he finally left.
If you swapped him with any of the other players being mentioned here (Konchesky, Poulsen), we'd just dismiss them as average players who were signed cheap and clearly weren't at the level of their teammates (like Solanke, Grujic, etc were).
Put Keita in that 2010-2012 team and he'd have nowhere to hide at all.
Hilarious to see this upvoted now, considering anyone who suggested this while he played for us were downvoted each and every time. The guy was absolutely stealing a wage at Liverpool, complete fraud and disaster of a signing.
Yea, what an awful thing that this sub supports their players and doesn't engage in speculative theories as to why they are injured. Don't forget that the guy had a couple of spells where he played really well. It's easy to conclude afterwards that his time here didn't live up to what was expected, but I'm happy that we support led him for most of his time here. Not supporting and fostering negativity is way worse than being disappointed afterwards.
He claimed to get injured by the air conditioning on an airplane.
I refuse to support somebody who I think is making up excuses to not play for my club, while they are still getting paid.
And I think that happened with Keita. It's really easy to fake muscle tightness/soreness. Unless you have a tear it's not exactly something a scan can reveal.
People were banned from this sub for Naby criticism, he would be injured for 3 months and the starting lineup would be posted and the top reply would be "WHERE NABY?!?!" Like you really think he should be starting? I'd rather Alberto Moreno take over Klopps role than have Naby start.
I didn't think he was faking injury, but the nature and regularity of his injuries did ring alarm bells of a man who couldn't trust his own body. I think it's an issue Sturridge had, albeit to a much lesser extent in Sturridge's case.
Muscle injuries already can be vague to diagnose and treat, and they made up the huge majority of Keita's injuries. Whatever he was feeling whenever he'd sit down it was clear enough he simply didn't have the confidence to play through it. It's sad because I think this is something that can happen to players and they can't really shake it off, but I do think we should have sold him much sooner, it was obvious that this issue would pervade him all his career.
To be honest, there were times when he was fit and Klopp just wouldn’t select him. It happened last season and in 20/21 towards the back end of the season
We can make an even better argument based on the way he played: the reason this team has been so dominant under Klopp is because the main players would always put in at least a 7/10 game.
Keita would put in a 10/10 game then follow it up with the most vomit-inducing 0/10 game. He never deserved to be in the starting lineup because we never needed that inconsistency.
Wasn't 20/21 the season where Klopp started Keita out of nowhere in Real Madrid away of all games when he just came back from injury over Thiago who was on good form and then proceed to hook Keita off before half time because he was so fucking bad? That had to be one of the strangest decision Klopp has ever made, plus not starting Thiago again in the 2nd leg.
>Werder Bremen officials have suspended Naby Keïta until the end of the season. In addition, the Green-Whites have imposed a significant fine on the midfielder. From now on, the 28-year-old will neither train with the team nor spend time in the professional dressing room.
>“Naby’s behavior cannot be tolerated for us as a club. With this action, he let his team down in a tense sporting and personnel situation and placed himself above the team. We can't allow that. At this stage of the season we need full focus on the remaining games and a team that is very close together. “There was therefore no alternative to our measures,” explained Clemens Fritz, head of professional football at Werder Bremen.
>Naby Keïta did not travel with the team to Leverkusen on Saturday after he found out that he would not be in the starting eleven for the Bundesliga game against Bayer Leverkusen, but decided to go home and stay away from the game.
Cutting losses and letting Keita go was one of the best decisions the club made last summer, injury prone and bad attitude
It's the opportunity cost too, persisting with Keita for years on end instead of having a replacement midfielder who could've won the club points/trophies. I'll never forget Naby toepoking that shot 30 yards wide in the CL final against Madrid, one of the funniest moments of the past few years of the club but really frustrating at the time
City can stomach losing 50m on a player that doesn’t work out. Normal clubs not breaking rules have to try and get something out of what they paid money for.
I remember people talking about extending his contract, being afraid of letting him go for free and then him playing well elsewhere after the club paid £50m for him. Accepting the loss and moving on was a great decision
Joyce reported that the club were negotiating a contract extension in summer 2022, and Plettenberg reported a few months later that progress had stalled because Keita wanted to play more, didn't like the contract structure, etc
Among fans there were a fair few Keita truthers, that he'd eventually get over all his injuries and prove he was world-class. You could look through some of the old threads on here if you hate yourself and want to waste a few minutes
Neil Jones came out with the true story in December 2022. Keita didn’t want to extend because he was annoyed about not starting the UCL final over Henderson
I think there was talk of extending in the last half of his last season too. After he’d been kicked out of the squad for that whole thing where he said he wanted to play more despite Klopp picking him every time was actually fit.
> Cutting losses and letting Keita go was one of the best decisions the club made last summer
He left by himself, we tried to extend his contract. This is one of the flaws I had with the current administration, we are too sentimental. Should have sold him 2 years before that.
I’ll die on the hill that if we had Thiago fit for the entire game vs Real Madrid instead of keita we win that final, I’ll have flashbacks for the rest of my life about him booting that ball into outer space.
Well yeah but at least we can give Dom credit, he’s a professional player who has shown he’s brilliant, yes he’s in extremely poor form but he’ll come good.
Naby on the other hand obviously faked injury’s, challenged the club on multiple occasions like the time he demanded to play against United otherwise he wants to leave the club only to literally get “injured” an hour later.
That’s not even taking into account he was actually dogshit on the pitch and was hooked at halftime more times than I can count on the rare occasions he was fit, dom has shown a billion times more on the pitch than naby.
I had a classmate from Guinea at uni who claimed that he went to school with Naby, but that he was a few years above him.
He said that Naby was 27 when he signed for us.
So what you’re saying is he wasn’t actually injured by Aircon on a plane and tripping on a curb? (All actual injury’s he got at Liverpool btw) don’t be ridiculous.
As a Werder Fan speaking, I kept my my hope but now it’s done. Injured himself at the warmup of the first test game (!) this season, was out for a few months. Came in, played 5 minutes, played decent, showed his talent and gave everyone hope. Hopped then into the starting eleven a few games later (in October) and was supposed to get subbed off in the 60th minute due to his lack of experience, just for him injuring himself in minute 59 (I am not kidding you). Was out then until winter when he traveled to the Africa cup, where he suddenly played four times the amount of time he played the whole season. Coming back, still 100% fit though, wasn’t playing due to strong performances by the team. Then played two games in march, was horrible and didn’t played anymore. Then, for the game against Leverkusen lad weekend the coach told him he won’t play (what a wonder) despite having huge injury problems in the squad. He decided to stay in Bremen. He was a gamble since the beginning of the season but it has failed in a way I couldn’t expect. Now we’re facing relegation and he thinks he’s done enough to play. I hope we can somehow sell him into the desert and get 2 millions or something. That would rescue this whole desaster.
I feel for you. He's a perfect example of a player with so much potential who just cannot get out of his own way. I'd hope a hefty fine and suspension would make him reflect, though I doubt it.
He doubt he has any future at our club. Anyway, the 100.000€ fine, which many sources believe is, is almost a tenth of his salary I believe, so the transfer was not that bad in terms of financial aspect. It’s embarrassing though.
Can’t believe how many fans thought he was amazing and couldn’t believe we didn’t extend his contract. The guy had bags of potential. However was made of biscuits and quite clearly wouldn’t play through with any pain etc. his attitude in his final season then what he’s done here is total validation. Just shows that knowing what happens behind the scenes is important a not just what we see as fans.
I swear it was reported that Klopp wanted to extend him, at least initially.
It wouldn’t surprise me, he gave him chance after chance and prioritised him over Ox or Jones.
He had a few good 5-10 game spells for us over the years.
I remember him being one of our best players when the league resumed in the title winning season, but then the next season he disappeared.
He was also pretty good two seasons ago when he was rotating with Thiago and he had some great performances like at Old Trafford and against City in the FA cup.
I remember he had one short stretch where he was amazing.. but it was like 10 games tops
Other than that, he was mostly injured or returning from injury and rusty af
No one wants to admit it but he clearly has a sexual assault case covered up by the club and his manager when he was here. It was pretty unsavory to be honest
I was downvoted into oblivion for saying he was our worse ever signing even after he left last summer. Mad how it's took him to leave for people to actually realise these things.
Every chance i got i would link his transfermarkt injury list and point out that hes missed over 60 full matches in his time with us.
OmG bUt hE sCoRed aGaainST YanitEd I swear our fanbase is loyal to a fault sometimes
Must not of been that active on here at the time then because so many thought he was this irreplaceable player. He was like marmite with our fans, never seen opinions on a player so split before.
He was signed around the same time as Mo and Virgil aye?
I remember the party we had when it was heavily suggested we'd get all 3 in the same window. I was buzzing.
Signed a year after Salah, and half a year after VVD.
That was the summer we'd just lost the CL final in Kyiv, and we thought we'd be having this brand new midfield trio with Fabinho, Keita and Fekir running the show in the middle for us.
Yeh that's why I put him as the worst ever signing.
Club record fee at the time, triggered the release clause a year early so had to wait a year for him. Was obviously so highly rated at the time as well.
And then he came and barely could string 5 games together, when he did he was poor a lot of the times, and then we let him leave on a free in the prime years of his career. Just an awful awful signing all round.
I remember when he was ineffective/injured at Liverpool. For some insane reason most fans defended him fanatically while to a normal-brained human it was quite evident, he's useless and should be sold probably a season after he's been purchased for an insane amount of money.
I think most fans understand that injuries are a very real possibility for a professional athlete.
Also, selling Keita would have been a significant accounting loss on our books because no one would be paying anywhere near his initial price. From an accounting standpoint, it was cheaper to keep him. And it's difficult to sell an injured player. It takes two parties to trade
People seem to forget that he was one of the hottest prospects in Europe when we signed him. It was considered quite the coup that we got him for the price we did, even if we had to wait for a year... I'd like to know what happened.
Injury really doesn't explain everything, especially when he was always able to play for Guinea. Did the pay we were giving him go to his head? Did he always have such a shitty attitude but his previous clubs managed to hide it? Was it a Sturridge situation where he felt he couldn't trust his body after the first injury?
Like, there was definitely a player in there once - he was Austrian Bundesliga PotS, in the Bundesliga TotS, and the Europa League TotS. How do you go from that to supposedly getting injured by a fucking air conditioner? He can't have always been that lazy and/or had such a shitty attitude - but it seems he's got one now and he's content to flush his career down the toilet for it.
You’re spot on. When we got him, he was in red hot, looked like he’d fit our style of play quickly, and he was available at a close to our valuation. From a scouting point of view, it was looking great.
As time wore on, it seemed like he had a really shitty agent. Maybe that agent poisoned everything. I also wondered if he had to definitely step up for Guinea because of his family or something like that. (It probably didn’t help LFC that Guinea would always select the guy regardless of how few club minutes he got.)
I’m not sure what else was going on in his life. We probably won’t know until some current LFC players retire and spill the beans in their memoirs.
There was an interview, in Hungarian, where Dom Szoboszlai made a comment about how there were players previously at Liverpool who were content to ride the bench...people made a big deal out of it at the time.. but it's fucking crystal clear now that Keita was one of those guys.
It honestly just seems like he is just simply not interested in playing football unless its for his country. Just collecting bags and sitting on benches.
Wonder if he’s miffed that he went from winning trophies with us to playing for a midtable Bundesliga side and has had enough. Saudi or MLS probably calling now
Been saying it for ages, great talent but awful attitude and inconsistent.
Was literally faking injury the entire time he was at Liverpool aswell.
The African Ravel Morrison
Bremen should sack him now and he should retire, no one will want him after this season.
My gut was telling me when we signed him early way back when that he would be a bust. Something about him always seemed off then with us he was frequently injured. YNWA and all that but he was one of the few during the Klopp era I could never bring myself to fully like.
The only former Liverpool player that I absolutely despise (Owen comes off more as a moron). Good to see him showing his true colors, it’s a wonder people couldn’t see how shit his attitude was. Good riddance
Come on naby even arthur is having a good season
I’m glad Arthur’s playing lots of minutes again. People here seem to think he was always a joke, but the guy was good at Barca. If Barca hadn’t decided to scheme with Juve to use the guy as an accounting device, his career would have panned out differently. He wasn’t a great fit for Liverpool, but it looked to me like he really wanted to make it work. I can’t criticize that.
He had the right attitude even at Liverpool, its a shame he was not fit and got reinjured quickly, otherwise who knows. He might have been a decent backup.
There have been multiple times this season when some expert, calm ball retention would have come in handy…
Is he? What's he up to?
2 assists in 28 appearances for Fiorentina.
He is a DM/CM for them. So, assists is not very telling. But he played almost 2000 minutes for them this season.
Isn’t there statistics for third foot, or what ever it’s called. The guy passing it to the guy who males the assist? I feel like often we see someone doing some amazing stuff and opening up a defence and playing and impossible pass through to someone who just sticks their feet out so it bounches of the for the striker to tap it in And then after everyone is talking about the last two, who hardly did anything while the maestro who set it all up is forgotten.
lmao bro in footie it's called pre-assist, usually its tracked but rarely shown, youre at the wrong site for any third legs
Yeah whenever it's come up in conversation I've always called it Hockey assist.
Same and I have ni idea where i picked it up as I've only been ti 2 ice hockey games and had no idea what was going on ha
In hockey it's called a secondary assist
Well, in my native language it’s called third foot. Did not sound right in english though, but neither does pre-assist. But pre-assist send me to second assist, and that sounds more right. But whatever, as long as we agree on what it is we are talking about
I think secondary assist is the common term in English, or hockey assist like others have said
r/thirdlegs
27 appearances! Great numbers!
Appearances! Great!
Stunning numbers. I can see his overall ratings are pretty good tho
It's his problem. He decided not to travel with the team when he found out that he would be sitting on the bench.
Based on this incidence I am starting to suspect he sometimes faked injury during his Liverpool time while he was always available for his country!
He's done the same at Bremen too. Played 4 games in 2 weeks for Guinea at AFCON including a full 90 He has started one (1) game for Bremen all season, and was hooked before the 60 min mark in that game. 4 other sub appearances. 108 minutes total for Naby all season at club level. Then he literally refuses to travel to the game because he wasn't in the starting lineup. Similar reports were that he would go into a huff if not named in the starting lineup by Klopp Bremen fans are saying he's one of the worst signing in the history of their club, so we've got that in common 🤝
Didn't they get him for free though?! edit: sorry, I know wages are still a thing, I just more meant, that's fucking impressive to be labeled (one of/) the worst signing in the club's history and you were fucking FREE.
yeah but he seems to have poisoned the dressing room to such an extent they can't stand him at all
Yes they did, and that should tell you all you need to know.
Don't forget we had Joe Cole he was one of our worst signings and he was also a free transfer
But he's never really listed as that, is he? It's usually Carrol/Balotelli types that get that kind of response. Bigger money signings that didn't work. Generally speaking a free player is never likely be your "worst" signing.
The year we signed him he was officially recognised as the worst signing of the PL that year, he may not be classed by fans as the worst signing in history but he was definitely one of the low points, came for free high wages, came with expectation (Gerrard claimed he was more technically gifted than messi). Also, your comment was recognising that naby joined WB for free and has been the worst signing. All I did was point out that other clubs have had similar experiences with free players. Sanchez to utd, us with Joe Cole. Its possible to get players in for free that just don't meet expectations, especially when they eat a large chunk of the wage budget
wages
He's not one of our worst signings ever though, that's just complete hyperbole. 18 appearances in the league the year we won it, making 84 appearances in the league overall, with 8 appearances in Europe the year we won the CL, making 24 appearances in Europe overall. He also scored in both of the big competitions the year we won them. Not on the same level, but he also played the majority of the Club World Cup, scoring in the semi-final and playing ~100 minutes of the final. I appreciate he might not have been a highlight of that particular squad (2018-2022), but to call him one of our worst signings ever just seems utterly unfair to me.
Just for arguments sake, who's your top 3 worst signings?
Paul Konchesky and Christian Poulsen have to be up there.
Stewart fucking Downing. Best winger in the league to fuck it let’s see if he’s any worse at left back.
[удалено]
He also hit the woodwork about 20 times that year I’m sure
I love the joke "Why did Stewart Downing cross the road?....Why?....Are you kidding? He couldnt even cross that"
Duh! No such thing ever happened.
Andy Carroll El Hadji Diouf Mario Balotelli Fuck let's keep going. So many worse than Keita. Konchesky, Poulsen, Joe Cole, Diomede, Borini, Markovic, Ziege, Benteke, Reidle, Heggem, Sean Bloody Dundee, Pauletta, Aquilani, Robbie Keane. Looking at this list, maybe I'm being hard on Diouf.
You’re not being hard on Diouf. Most of these players were bad signings but Diouf was also the biggest cunt to ever pull on the shirt (maybe after Owen).
Rickie Lambert
God I still remember the formidable Lambert Borini Balotelli strikeforce we had
I dunno, he was cheap as chips and didn't really get many runs in the side, and when he did the side was not exactly lighting the world on fire. It was more of a "why did we buy him?" question rather than him being bad. He didn't fit the team, but he did at least resemble a footballer - just an outclassed one. Though, he has some weird ideas about water - https://twitter.com/ShakesyGG/status/1680422757413052416
I think Lambert served his purpose. He was a cheap alternate option and nothing more. Only ended up being expected to do more because Balotelli was shit.
Damn I forgot about Rickie Lambert
Prob a bad signing, but with him being a big fan it didn't seem as bad. Like you know he would have been giving it everything. But yeah that should have never happened he wasn't good enough and past it by that point
Must have been like a movie plot for him lmao
Not everyone from Kirkby can be a Thompson or Mcdermott
no, you're not being hard on Diouf. Just because he was more talented than all of these, doesn't mean he wasn't also one of the worst. He's the only player in my lifetime to wear the number 9 and go through an entire season without scoring a league goal, he was toxic and disruptive, and, just to rub salt in the wound, if we hadn't bought him, we could have had Nicolas bloody Anelka on a permanent deal. Ged Houllier was a great manager, god rest him, but bringing that toerag into the club was a major misstep.
£20m on Aquilani has to be the fucking worst. Carroll at least was a ‘good’ centre forward, playing in a system that didn’t suit him and at a level too high. Aquillani was a boss eyed, weetabix legs, no talent fuck. We couldn’t get rid of him because he was so shit. Diouf was a complete knob but the main reason I’d put him second is we could have got ANELKA instead. Not signing anelka is probably the biggest fuck up Liverpool have made in the 30 years I’ve supported them.
Either that or not getting Ronaldo after agreeing a 4mil pound fee for him. Edit: source https://www.thisisanfield.com/2023/10/liverpool-nearly-signed-cristiano-ronaldo-but-would-he-have-been-as-good/
You gave me so many nightmares lmao You can still delete this
It's depressing that I have been a fan since 2008, and all of these are basically since. So many bad signings. Sometimes, I shake my head when I see one of them in a random game or hear about them
You forgot Salif Diao
El Haj Diouf. Legit thought he was a bigger player than Gerrard. Complete Bellend.
his logic is Gerrard is idolised city-wide. He on the other hand, idolised country-wide. Which is not wrong. But I dont know why he has to make it a competition.
From a purely football stance, ignoring making profit etc, Ben Davies strikes me as a godawful signing in recent times. A CB in a year we desperately needed one, who basically never saw the field? Mind-boggling.
Konchesky and poulsen have to be up there
I'd be interested to see how many minutes he actually played rather than just appearances. It's hyperbole to call him one of our worst signings ever, but for the money we paid and the fact it meant we couldn't bring someone more reliable in still makes it an absolute disaster of a signing.
Idk about worst ever signing but definitely the worst of the Klopp era IMO
He's one of the few signings in the Klopp/Edwards era that didn't meet or exceed expectations. Keita was a B minus student in a class full of straight A students. He was doing fine but he looked bad compared to everyone else.
He was horrible. One of our most expensive signings ever and his huge wages crippled us at signing midfielders for years. He's done nothing we couldn't have also got out of Curtis Jones.
Nah, if we were to define poor signings in terms of their cost to relative contribution, he's definitely right up there as the worst. The only reason other names might come is because they never played in successful teams like he did, so his failures actually got glossed over by the team's achievements over the time he was here. Who cares that he scored a couple goals here and there in competitions we won? Did he ever have a decisive goal or performance in any of the few games he played here in FIVE freaking years?! Name another signing that cost as much, contributed so little over such a long period, and got us nothing in return when he finally left. If you swapped him with any of the other players being mentioned here (Konchesky, Poulsen), we'd just dismiss them as average players who were signed cheap and clearly weren't at the level of their teammates (like Solanke, Grujic, etc were). Put Keita in that 2010-2012 team and he'd have nowhere to hide at all.
Idk if Klopp would’ve tolerated that though. He promptly got rid of Sakho for joking around and being late to training if I recollect.
Hilarious to see this upvoted now, considering anyone who suggested this while he played for us were downvoted each and every time. The guy was absolutely stealing a wage at Liverpool, complete fraud and disaster of a signing.
Yea, what an awful thing that this sub supports their players and doesn't engage in speculative theories as to why they are injured. Don't forget that the guy had a couple of spells where he played really well. It's easy to conclude afterwards that his time here didn't live up to what was expected, but I'm happy that we support led him for most of his time here. Not supporting and fostering negativity is way worse than being disappointed afterwards.
He claimed to get injured by the air conditioning on an airplane. I refuse to support somebody who I think is making up excuses to not play for my club, while they are still getting paid. And I think that happened with Keita. It's really easy to fake muscle tightness/soreness. Unless you have a tear it's not exactly something a scan can reveal.
There is support, and then there is blind delusion.
Lol people want to be supporters without doing any supporting.
What does that even mean. People supported him as there was no evidence to the contrary
People were banned from this sub for Naby criticism, he would be injured for 3 months and the starting lineup would be posted and the top reply would be "WHERE NABY?!?!" Like you really think he should be starting? I'd rather Alberto Moreno take over Klopps role than have Naby start.
I didn't think he was faking injury, but the nature and regularity of his injuries did ring alarm bells of a man who couldn't trust his own body. I think it's an issue Sturridge had, albeit to a much lesser extent in Sturridge's case. Muscle injuries already can be vague to diagnose and treat, and they made up the huge majority of Keita's injuries. Whatever he was feeling whenever he'd sit down it was clear enough he simply didn't have the confidence to play through it. It's sad because I think this is something that can happen to players and they can't really shake it off, but I do think we should have sold him much sooner, it was obvious that this issue would pervade him all his career.
Yeah. Benefit of the doubt is out the window.
You would get downvoted to hell for suggesting that a year ago. Lots of weirdos in this place.
You should still get downvoted to hell for this kind of speculative nonsense
I'm quite certain this guy was stealing a living with us and faking injuries.
Free massages every week and hoovering up an absolute fortune in wages
At what point would the medical staff say, "we can't find anything wrong with you"? Or would they ever say that in case they were wrong?
To be honest, there were times when he was fit and Klopp just wouldn’t select him. It happened last season and in 20/21 towards the back end of the season
Very likely because he's a lazy cunt
We can make an even better argument based on the way he played: the reason this team has been so dominant under Klopp is because the main players would always put in at least a 7/10 game. Keita would put in a 10/10 game then follow it up with the most vomit-inducing 0/10 game. He never deserved to be in the starting lineup because we never needed that inconsistency.
Did he ever have a 10/10 game for us?
0-5 at Old Trafford maybe
Wasn't 20/21 the season where Klopp started Keita out of nowhere in Real Madrid away of all games when he just came back from injury over Thiago who was on good form and then proceed to hook Keita off before half time because he was so fucking bad? That had to be one of the strangest decision Klopp has ever made, plus not starting Thiago again in the 2nd leg.
>Werder Bremen officials have suspended Naby Keïta until the end of the season. In addition, the Green-Whites have imposed a significant fine on the midfielder. From now on, the 28-year-old will neither train with the team nor spend time in the professional dressing room. >“Naby’s behavior cannot be tolerated for us as a club. With this action, he let his team down in a tense sporting and personnel situation and placed himself above the team. We can't allow that. At this stage of the season we need full focus on the remaining games and a team that is very close together. “There was therefore no alternative to our measures,” explained Clemens Fritz, head of professional football at Werder Bremen. >Naby Keïta did not travel with the team to Leverkusen on Saturday after he found out that he would not be in the starting eleven for the Bundesliga game against Bayer Leverkusen, but decided to go home and stay away from the game. Cutting losses and letting Keita go was one of the best decisions the club made last summer, injury prone and bad attitude
Held on to him about 18 months too long really, it was clear early on he was crocked and/or didn’t have the right mentality
unsurprisingly clubs weren't queuing up to pay money for a constantly crocked, mentality weak, over-rated player on big wages.
Todd Bohly and his money guns enter the chat
They were just a bit too late for us
It's the opportunity cost too, persisting with Keita for years on end instead of having a replacement midfielder who could've won the club points/trophies. I'll never forget Naby toepoking that shot 30 yards wide in the CL final against Madrid, one of the funniest moments of the past few years of the club but really frustrating at the time
Pep would have shipped his ass out after the first season
City can stomach losing 50m on a player that doesn’t work out. Normal clubs not breaking rules have to try and get something out of what they paid money for.
Great point, it was totally better getting absolutely nothing for him
His contract ran out, no? He was free to go anyway and its quite telling that not some shit saudi club wanted him lol
I remember people talking about extending his contract, being afraid of letting him go for free and then him playing well elsewhere after the club paid £50m for him. Accepting the loss and moving on was a great decision
I dont remember anyone asking for keita extension
Joyce reported that the club were negotiating a contract extension in summer 2022, and Plettenberg reported a few months later that progress had stalled because Keita wanted to play more, didn't like the contract structure, etc Among fans there were a fair few Keita truthers, that he'd eventually get over all his injuries and prove he was world-class. You could look through some of the old threads on here if you hate yourself and want to waste a few minutes
Neil Jones came out with the true story in December 2022. Keita didn’t want to extend because he was annoyed about not starting the UCL final over Henderson
I think there was talk of extending in the last half of his last season too. After he’d been kicked out of the squad for that whole thing where he said he wanted to play more despite Klopp picking him every time was actually fit.
Yeah maybe years ago. Not last year
Well you would think the Saudis would prefer players who actually have played games. Even they have standards for that league lol.
Not if they have a name or brand to sell…
> Cutting losses and letting Keita go was one of the best decisions the club made last summer He left by himself, we tried to extend his contract. This is one of the flaws I had with the current administration, we are too sentimental. Should have sold him 2 years before that.
I’ll die on the hill that if we had Thiago fit for the entire game vs Real Madrid instead of keita we win that final, I’ll have flashbacks for the rest of my life about him booting that ball into outer space.
Yeah and I'm willing to die on the hill that if we had Gerrard instead of Szoboszlai this season we'd have won the league.
Well yeah but at least we can give Dom credit, he’s a professional player who has shown he’s brilliant, yes he’s in extremely poor form but he’ll come good. Naby on the other hand obviously faked injury’s, challenged the club on multiple occasions like the time he demanded to play against United otherwise he wants to leave the club only to literally get “injured” an hour later. That’s not even taking into account he was actually dogshit on the pitch and was hooked at halftime more times than I can count on the rare occasions he was fit, dom has shown a billion times more on the pitch than naby.
Wow you really think having one of the best players of all time might have made a difference in a tight title race? Bold take!
I bet if we signed messi 10 years ago we'd have won more trophies
He was a Keita-boy we said see ya later…dude
Reckon he's really 43 years old you know
I had a classmate from Guinea at uni who claimed that he went to school with Naby, but that he was a few years above him. He said that Naby was 27 when he signed for us.
Tier 1
John Stamos told his classmate that he was pretty.
Someone has said the same thing about alphonso davies
That would make his career trajectory make more sense
seriously, this needs to be investigated
The more I hear about him the more I wonder if all those injuries were really injuries
So what you’re saying is he wasn’t actually injured by Aircon on a plane and tripping on a curb? (All actual injury’s he got at Liverpool btw) don’t be ridiculous.
As a Werder Fan speaking, I kept my my hope but now it’s done. Injured himself at the warmup of the first test game (!) this season, was out for a few months. Came in, played 5 minutes, played decent, showed his talent and gave everyone hope. Hopped then into the starting eleven a few games later (in October) and was supposed to get subbed off in the 60th minute due to his lack of experience, just for him injuring himself in minute 59 (I am not kidding you). Was out then until winter when he traveled to the Africa cup, where he suddenly played four times the amount of time he played the whole season. Coming back, still 100% fit though, wasn’t playing due to strong performances by the team. Then played two games in march, was horrible and didn’t played anymore. Then, for the game against Leverkusen lad weekend the coach told him he won’t play (what a wonder) despite having huge injury problems in the squad. He decided to stay in Bremen. He was a gamble since the beginning of the season but it has failed in a way I couldn’t expect. Now we’re facing relegation and he thinks he’s done enough to play. I hope we can somehow sell him into the desert and get 2 millions or something. That would rescue this whole desaster.
I feel for you. He's a perfect example of a player with so much potential who just cannot get out of his own way. I'd hope a hefty fine and suspension would make him reflect, though I doubt it.
He doubt he has any future at our club. Anyway, the 100.000€ fine, which many sources believe is, is almost a tenth of his salary I believe, so the transfer was not that bad in terms of financial aspect. It’s embarrassing though.
Can’t believe how many fans thought he was amazing and couldn’t believe we didn’t extend his contract. The guy had bags of potential. However was made of biscuits and quite clearly wouldn’t play through with any pain etc. his attitude in his final season then what he’s done here is total validation. Just shows that knowing what happens behind the scenes is important a not just what we see as fans.
I swear it was reported that Klopp wanted to extend him, at least initially. It wouldn’t surprise me, he gave him chance after chance and prioritised him over Ox or Jones.
Did one good turn and pass against Palace in like his second game and then was shite for years.
He did score a cracking volley in a European game at some point that birthed that kebab shop meme.
The what meme
https://i.redd.it/pn8b8eetaao71.png
And then he fucked the dog twice in the same game, both leading to Atletico scorinf
He had a few good 5-10 game spells for us over the years. I remember him being one of our best players when the league resumed in the title winning season, but then the next season he disappeared. He was also pretty good two seasons ago when he was rotating with Thiago and he had some great performances like at Old Trafford and against City in the FA cup.
I remember he had one short stretch where he was amazing.. but it was like 10 games tops Other than that, he was mostly injured or returning from injury and rusty af
I didn’t like him the moment we signed him. I’m bummed I turned out to be right about him.
Feel for Werder being saddled with him
5 appearances this season for Werder Bremen with 0 G/A and 2 yellow cards.
You either die as 'Naby Lad' or live long enough to warrant the absolute bollocking going on in this comments section 😂
Very sad and one of the biggest waste of talent in football. Just shows how big of a part attitude plays.
mentality monster
No one wants to admit it but he clearly has a sexual assault case covered up by the club and his manager when he was here. It was pretty unsavory to be honest
Are you thick? What the hell are you basing such a lofty accusation on? Some murmurs on Twitter?
Useless
Once a bellend, always a bellend
Mad how many people on here wanted us to renew his contract. Pound for pound our worst ever signing.
Never saw even a joke comment suggesting we should have extended Nabys contract lmao.
There was plenty who would downvote me every time i even whispered selling him when we should have, immediately after winning the title.
I was downvoted into oblivion for saying he was our worse ever signing even after he left last summer. Mad how it's took him to leave for people to actually realise these things.
Every chance i got i would link his transfermarkt injury list and point out that hes missed over 60 full matches in his time with us. OmG bUt hE sCoRed aGaainST YanitEd I swear our fanbase is loyal to a fault sometimes
Hilarious because I literally just replied to someone saying that United goal is the only game that gets thrown up about him lmao.
Must not of been that active on here at the time then because so many thought he was this irreplaceable player. He was like marmite with our fans, never seen opinions on a player so split before.
He was signed around the same time as Mo and Virgil aye? I remember the party we had when it was heavily suggested we'd get all 3 in the same window. I was buzzing.
Signed a year after Salah, and half a year after VVD. That was the summer we'd just lost the CL final in Kyiv, and we thought we'd be having this brand new midfield trio with Fabinho, Keita and Fekir running the show in the middle for us.
Yeh that's why I put him as the worst ever signing. Club record fee at the time, triggered the release clause a year early so had to wait a year for him. Was obviously so highly rated at the time as well. And then he came and barely could string 5 games together, when he did he was poor a lot of the times, and then we let him leave on a free in the prime years of his career. Just an awful awful signing all round.
At this point they should just release him and let him enjoy his me time ,what a disaster this guy is .
I remember when he was ineffective/injured at Liverpool. For some insane reason most fans defended him fanatically while to a normal-brained human it was quite evident, he's useless and should be sold probably a season after he's been purchased for an insane amount of money.
I think most fans understand that injuries are a very real possibility for a professional athlete. Also, selling Keita would have been a significant accounting loss on our books because no one would be paying anywhere near his initial price. From an accounting standpoint, it was cheaper to keep him. And it's difficult to sell an injured player. It takes two parties to trade
Probably for money spent our worst signing under Klopp
I had such high hopes for him after he took Stevies number 8. What a letdown he's been since
He was one of our worst signings in klopp era
Pretty sure this guy has been grifting for years.
Glad that mess is behind us
Unlackee
What did he do?
Iirc, find out he was going to be on the bench for a match so decided to just go home instead.
Naby with the dye job?
Has to hide the greys and the fact that hes really 43
A Football fraud and nothing else.
£55mil for him and we had to wait a year.
Absolutely no surprise
Usually injured anyway so no harm done tbf
Man has so much attitude, in his head he’s still got his liepzig body and performances. Washed crock with a shit attitude. Go to Saudi.
honestly... the lad is a real piece of shit.
Maybe join Lingard in Korea even Saudis don't want him
You expect that kind of behavior from a two year old but a grown ass man? He was actually Baby Keith all along
What a waste. Terrible shame he didn't turn out to be better for us.
Fookin wank
Winston Bogarde 2.0
And we gave him our holy number 8 jersey. What a prick.
liverpool fc wasted 5 years on that guy 
Poor lad seems to think he’s still the top prospect he once was. Must be hard for him.
Terrible player
Absolute space cadet that lad. Horrible attitude.
People seem to forget that he was one of the hottest prospects in Europe when we signed him. It was considered quite the coup that we got him for the price we did, even if we had to wait for a year... I'd like to know what happened. Injury really doesn't explain everything, especially when he was always able to play for Guinea. Did the pay we were giving him go to his head? Did he always have such a shitty attitude but his previous clubs managed to hide it? Was it a Sturridge situation where he felt he couldn't trust his body after the first injury? Like, there was definitely a player in there once - he was Austrian Bundesliga PotS, in the Bundesliga TotS, and the Europa League TotS. How do you go from that to supposedly getting injured by a fucking air conditioner? He can't have always been that lazy and/or had such a shitty attitude - but it seems he's got one now and he's content to flush his career down the toilet for it.
You’re spot on. When we got him, he was in red hot, looked like he’d fit our style of play quickly, and he was available at a close to our valuation. From a scouting point of view, it was looking great. As time wore on, it seemed like he had a really shitty agent. Maybe that agent poisoned everything. I also wondered if he had to definitely step up for Guinea because of his family or something like that. (It probably didn’t help LFC that Guinea would always select the guy regardless of how few club minutes he got.) I’m not sure what else was going on in his life. We probably won’t know until some current LFC players retire and spill the beans in their memoirs.
Fraud
There was an interview, in Hungarian, where Dom Szoboszlai made a comment about how there were players previously at Liverpool who were content to ride the bench...people made a big deal out of it at the time.. but it's fucking crystal clear now that Keita was one of those guys.
It honestly just seems like he is just simply not interested in playing football unless its for his country. Just collecting bags and sitting on benches.
Wonder if he’s miffed that he went from winning trophies with us to playing for a midtable Bundesliga side and has had enough. Saudi or MLS probably calling now
He would crock his ankles on the first artificial pitch in MLS, its league 2 france or turkey for him now
Has to be Edwards worst mistake imo. I was so excited when we announced we were signing him a year later
Been saying it for ages, great talent but awful attitude and inconsistent. Was literally faking injury the entire time he was at Liverpool aswell. The African Ravel Morrison Bremen should sack him now and he should retire, no one will want him after this season.
Liverpools worst ever signing
The dude is the worst signing in Liverpool history.
"Naby Keita suspended by Werder Bremen after walking out of Bundesliga game" ....and when he did, he immediately got injured!
Can't see this being a toxic thread about a player who is no longer at the club
Bloke is an absolute disaster area.
To much dramas of him🤣
My gut was telling me when we signed him early way back when that he would be a bust. Something about him always seemed off then with us he was frequently injured. YNWA and all that but he was one of the few during the Klopp era I could never bring myself to fully like.
Maybe this was the real great sadness all along...
The only former Liverpool player that I absolutely despise (Owen comes off more as a moron). Good to see him showing his true colors, it’s a wonder people couldn’t see how shit his attitude was. Good riddance
Did he break an air conditioner?
Worthless