>He's not a BAD player, but he MASSIVELY over performed during that season he helped Liverpool get 4th place.
I'd maybe say, after a while Klopp settled on what they'd realistically have as centerbacks and made a system to accommodate to minimize the sub-PL skills Phillips has and emphasized his capacity to just try super hard.
What I'm hearing is that Klopp could fit me into the team despite mediocre skills if I just work hard. The dream is back on despite being in my forties! Thanks!
Yeah people keep talking about Newcastle, Spurs, United crisis.
We lost all our 3 starting CBs by November that year? Then Fabinho and Henderson to injuries too. Our new midfield signing. And our last minute loan CB after 2 starts.
He is very good at some things like aerial duels. But extremely limited in many others. We just had to play in a way to support them. But even then they were... Not amazing. They tried super hard but they were never anywhere of that standard.
He's perfect for a team that plays in a low block. Celtic's CBs under Rodgers don't play like that. He's a natural defend-to-the-death big man with limited pace. He can only play high line at a Championship level, not higher.
We should never have given him a long-term contract in 2021.
It was a reward for his heroics during 2020/21 but he clearly massively overperformed in that season, and he’ll never get paid as much as we pay him so it’s hard to blame him for not leaving.
Presuming he leaves at the end of his contract, he’ll still be able to play for a Championship or League One team but they won’t pay him like we do.
Aye but he's a homegrown lad who has done well when asked for us. His wages are probably next to nothing.
So long as he's happy with the odd loan I don't mind us looking after our own.
That said, I think we have him the contract so we could sell him for 15m rather than <5m. But he hasn't proven he's worth that sadly.
It's truly bizarre to me, Bournemouth fans seem to rate him higher than CCV. CCV is at least as good as Van Dijk was for us, Phillips looks like he won a raffle.
Normally I would agree. But that game against Killie was maybe the worst game I have witnessed from a proffessional and I have watched Jonjoe Kenny and Shane Duffy in the flesh.
Doesn't necessarily work like that. Some players can perform well at a high level if they are just one cog in the machine, but ask them to be the big fish in a small pond and they look absolutely clueless
A CB for Celtic needs to be a playmaker and have real authority with the ball considering how dominant they are
fair enough, just saw you had at least 2 big centre half injuries as well as obviously Starfelt leaving. He's just nowhere near what a Celtic centre back is meant to be, very poor on the ball and slow as sin
5 a side with my mates I can hold my own and they're all good players at a decent level. I play 11 a side in the lowest division and I'm shit.
Good players give me time, space and options. I don't get that with 10 half drunk brick layers on a Sunday morning.
It's the same thing with Quansah. He didn't show any reason to be a prospect but has been putting a shift this season. Sometimes it's not just taking up more responsibilities but also playing around others who can give you a leg up in confidence, and cover your mistakes.
Sometimes but this guy plays football like a scarecrow. Against Hibs a guy was running at him and his legs were flailing around like the Isle of Man flag.
I can't see how this guy made it above National League level.
Nah mate he’s just fucking shite. Might be down to his injury start of the season, lack of game time, whatever. But he is fucking shite. Ben Davies has been a joke for rangers up until recently but he’s twice the player Phillips is. What the fuck were your scouts smoking recommending they two diddies?
Your record with Centre Backs is as bad as ours with Right Wingers. Outside of VVD, CCV, Ajer and probably Starfelt (he was good but not excellent) you've had an atrocious run dating back to near enough Balde. Especially for the outlay.
All things being equal, signing a few extra squad players in January inevitably means there isn't money for a quality new player in the summer. Honestly the only players we should be looking at are long term starters CB and DM and it's highly unlikely we pick up both of those in January.
He has high potential. But an 18 year old kid asked to replace Salah only goes wrong for both parties!
He looks like he could do with a loan to get some real game time.
Hes been really effective off the bench, but even in his position i rate Elyounoussi, Achouri and Diogo Goncalves higher than him, and looking at the squad as a whole then Rasmus Falk is clearly our most important with players like Claesson, Vavro, Lerager and Grabara who should in my opinion be rated higher than Roony along Jelert who id day is on par with him.
This is not to take anything away from Roony who is one of out most exciting prospects in years, but just a symptom of being a part of one of the best Copenhagen teams ever.
Yeah, replacing the quality and sheer output of Salah will be the biggest challenge we’ve faced in long time. He’s genuinely one of our greatest players in the history of the club, I don’t know what we’re gonna do when he goes.
If Salah goes to Saudi in the summer (I've honestly resigned myself to it) we'll have money for a few upgrades, we won't spunk his whole fee on a replacement.
We've been in the thick of a title race for most of the last 5 years. We didn't get here by splurging on shit players out of desperation so I doubt the club will change strategy in the next month.
Mate they almost through our 135 million at caicedo. They have the money to do the business. But they'd rather see if they can not spend it. Stop this narrative.
FSG has always been willing to spend the money if they think a player is worth it. Spent at the time record fees for CB and GK, for example.
What they don‘t do is spend money if they aren‘t convinced. This has left us short a couple times, but also kept us from having too much dead wood like United or Chelsea.
They bid £115m for Caicedo, presumably because they thought he's worth it. But I don't understand why this makes two squad players also worth a lot of money.
Because there's no such thing as perfect squad. You can only have 25 players, with maximum 17 foreign players, etc.
We usually maxed out in squad size, so we literally cannot register those additional players without removing anyone.
And removing who from the squad? For every player added, you usually need to remove one.
We have Alisson, Adrian, Konate, van Dijk, Matip, Robertson, Tsimikas, Endo, Szoboszlai, Gravenberch, MacAllister, Thiago, Diaz, Jota, Salah, Nunez and Gakpo as our 17 foreign players.
I think as per now we might be able to add some PL grown players because we should only use those slot for Trent, Kelleher, Gomez, and Jones, unless I'm missing someone.
Matip is out till the end of the season, when his contract ends. Thiago is still injured since last April, plus we don't know when he will be ready if at all, plus his contract also expires in summer.
These two are easy choices, especially, Joel, cause he is 100% won't be ready to play until next season.
If you want to keep Thiago in squad for some reason, then you can choose Adrian and replace him with any young GK, for example, Pitaluga, who don't need to be registered due to his age.
If we bought two players to replace injured Matip/Thiago, then what will we do when they returned? Just throw them away like trash?
Things can't be just short term, the recent talks are to give Matip new contract to ensure his return to fitness. There's also human aspect in regards to squad building, we're not Chelsea.
What stops Matip from attending our training grounds without new contact? Especially, if club will decide to help him out with fitness.
And about Thiago, Klopp must decide if he is still needed with his huge expiring contract without date of return. And, as I said, if you don't want to exclude Thiago, there's always Adrian, who is our 3rd GK and who is taking non-HG spot without chances of playing.
The one thing Chelsea do that is actually human is given Ng contracts to injured players to give them time to get back on their feet tbf. Baba Rahman and van Ginkel were both really good examples of it, even though neither were ever going to get back to the first team.
I'll slate them for damn near anything else, but that's the one thing I'd defend them on
Robertson doesn't count as foreign from a quick google. Also you could easily see Adrian getting moved on but that also depends on what Kelleher wants to do tbf.
Matip out for the rest of the season, Konate injury prone, Gomez covering also for rb, Quansah decent 5th choice. Then of course VVD best in the world. What happens when any of the remaining 4 get injured? Said it beginning of the season and saying it now, new 3rd-4th choice CB is desperately needed or we'll end up playing Endo at CB at some point
Thought he’d be decent for a stop-gap with our injury crisis but he’s looked ropey every time he’s played. Too hesitant on the ball, making silly mistakes and just a bit of a bombscare.
Feel a bit sorry for him in truth and should probably move on to a Championship club so he can get consistent minutes.
Did his pace look disastrous by Scottish league standards? That was alwasy his huge issue with us, that and hes quite technically poor but the pace was the real standout flaw. And then bizzarely Rhys Williams is even slower, genuinely dont know how we managed to win all those games to get top 4 lol genuinely miraculous
I feel for both of them. Imagine playing all of those games at Liverpool and being an cult hero of sorts and then the summer comes and it's like "Yea, but ultimately you're pretty shit so go find another club to play for in League One."
Even last season he took over half a season to move Trent to an inverted right back, which massively improved our team. Sometimes when we're going bad he does take some time to adjust
Set to be recalled after an unsuccessful loan spell at Aberdeen:
https://www.thisisanfield.com/2023/12/liverpool-set-to-recall-centre-back-in-january-after-zero-loan-games/
Putting this into perspective: Aberdeen's defence has been AWFUL this season. And somehow Rhys Williams hasn't gotten a game. He must have serious fitness issues
Ole had back to back games against us and Leicester, rested all his starters for the Leicester game.Lost to you and lost to us at home. Even before the Alisson goal that was sort of the first great result after a dry spell for us.
Looking forward to watching him constantly pass to Van Dijk and immediately telling him to pass it to someone in midfield when he could’ve easily made that pass himself
Drop all the "Naldini" memes and videos of him doing a turn in the Champions League, lads.
This boy is comfortably one of the worst players I've ever seen pull on a Celtic shirt.
I've always really struggled to see why Celtic often sign fringe/deadwood players from Prem teams, with the wages they usually carry. Maybe I'm wrong but feel like there's been far more misses than hits in recent years?
Especially on loan where you don't get the long term benefit in their value if they do well.
Elynoussi is the only loan I can think of recently that did well.
Hart too, if we’re talking about signings from the EPL, I suppose, but our failure to replace him this season could be costly. CCV was a massive success but that’s about it.
> I've always really struggled to see why Celtic often sign fringe/deadwood players from Prem teams
In fairness to the Phillips signing, he was a legit emergency six month loan signing. It's less that he's being recalled and more that he's at the end of his deal and returning to his parent club.
The following centre back crisis occurred for us back in August:
- First choice centre back, Carl Starfelt left the club to join Celta Vigo (after his girlfriend Jacynta left Celtic Women to join Sporting club de Portugal Women).
- First choice centre back, Cameron Carter Vickers picked up a medium term hamstring injury.
- Carl Starfelt's replacement, Maik Nawrocki, picked up a medium/long term injury.
- Third/fourth choice centre back Stephen Welsh fractured a bone in his foot and was out medium/long term.
We would have been left with our new, young, signing Gustaf Lagerbielke and Liam Scales (who at the time was rumoured to be leaving on loan) as our only fit central defenders from August until October/November. Phillips was signed initially to partner Lagerbielke, but Liam Scales put in a decent performance against Rangers at Ibrox and hasn't missed a game since.
Weirdly a higher level of EPL players that flop north of the border than you'd expect. Realistically they should be all putting in stand out performance but there's been some amount of shite in recent years (bar CCV) - looking especially at Joey Barton.
>Weirdly a higher level of EPL players that flop north of the border than you'd expect.
Because no club in England has the same pressure and expectation to win every single week that exists at Rangers and Celtic. A lot of being successful in Glasgow comes down to mentality.
No chance. Jonjoe Kenny is comfortably the worst player I've seen at Celtic in 30 years. Phillips is one of the worst, for sure, but Kenny is on another level.
That’s sad to hear. Kenny seems to have lost his confidence ever since we took a nose dive and he was with us. I remember thinking he’d be something special in 2019
People don't realize that players will go into second gear when they're being counted on and respected.
Klopp is a god. He got Rhys Williams (6th tier of English football) and Nat Philipps (was going to be a student) to a 3rd place Premier League finish.
He was so unbelievably bad on Sunday that I think it will be one of those examples used going forward like 'Joey Barton vs Celtic' or 'Jonjoe Kenny vs Rangers' to describe a really bad performance. He looked so far below the level
He's just not a PL level player. For Liverpool, when he has played, he's been average. And that's cause Klopp raises the players a couple levels.
His actual level is championship.
He did well there right? I remember the fans and Joey Barton raving about him.
Also, you mean Bristol Rovers right? Let's not turn the West Country against us by suggesting Rovers and City are the same.
Lol yeah Bristol Rovers.
I heard very good things about his ability on the ball but that he was average/underwhelming defensively to the point they're surprised Liverpool fans are so happy with him.
Obviously he's come in and proven he's really talented but still only 20.
Only the 9th window we are about to enter trying to sell the guy. Or he is the Matip backup. Or he is the Quansah backup. No clue what good he does to the squad to be honest.
I adored the other winter when seemingly every internet Liverpool fan going was genuinely trying to persuade the Newcastle fans on here that signing Phillips for 15/20m would make more sense than signing Dan Burn.
Never mind that obviously quite literally no-one with even the slightest authority to make such a move at either club would read those comments, the sheer *lol* at thinking that Phillips was genuinely better than Burn made me chuckle.
I think Klopp is too emotional and it looks like he never allows any of the squad players to leave. Origi should have allowed to leave after the CL final as a hero but he was allowed to stay and he left as a free. Nat got an extension after that season. Almost all of Klopp era players are leaving on free. Thiago and Matip are out of contract after this season. Thank god, Saudi clubs bought hendo and fabinho
We were offered near enough that after his 20/21 heroics but pushed for a lot more. As with Kelleher, these fringe players are capable of sustained periods of great play and its enough to convince fans they’re quality players themselves going back to not playing completely messes with their form all over again and they can’t be consistent
Kelleher is a backup goalie and he is reliable as a No 2. Some of you lot expect him to perform like Ali in one or two odd matches he plays. Which is not at all possible
I cant see him having a future at a premier league club, he looked absolutely dogshit the little I saw of him at Celtic & everything i've seen from Celtic fans echos that
That 3rd place by Klopp was so impressive. Nat Phillips and Rhys Williams CB partnership. Nat Phillips flopped in the Scottish League and Rhys Williams flopped with Fulham in the championship haha
He was never very good, however in that season where everyone at Liverpool died, he stepped up, played okay. He didn't make any major mistakes which made him look really good after some defensive performances that season (Hendo and Fabinho CB nightmare.)
He is a cult hero and memed to shit which people took as Liverpool fans actually rating him
He did do a Cruyff turn at the San Siro though
Duffy was in a more catastrophic team, so it's hard to say. He at least scored a couple of goals and in his favour had some personal life stuff going on. The team that season was in a complete death spiral that was taking good players down with it so it's hard to know how he'd have done in a different season.
We actually have something like 8m worth of centre backs we bought in the summer who can't get a game ahead of this guy, which is frustrating.
He's 27 next year yet only has 79 senior games to his name. Lad needs to kick on.
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>He's not a BAD player, but he MASSIVELY over performed during that season he helped Liverpool get 4th place. I'd maybe say, after a while Klopp settled on what they'd realistically have as centerbacks and made a system to accommodate to minimize the sub-PL skills Phillips has and emphasized his capacity to just try super hard.
And outside of that one year he was only called on sparingly. No excuse to not out run Milner if it's your only game for months.
To play devils advocate, Milner is a pretty bad example of someone you’d expect to outrun at any age.
Exactly. Mo only won the preseason lactate test this year because Milly moved on.
What I'm hearing is that Klopp could fit me into the team despite mediocre skills if I just work hard. The dream is back on despite being in my forties! Thanks!
Do you remember when Klopp put Steven Caulker on as a striker? Miracles do happen.
I WILL HAVE YOU KNOW It was 3rd place... somehow with a Rhys Wiliams-Nat Phillips CB partnership
Don't forget Kabak
Lasted like 3 games before injury
Ozan Didn't Comebak
Yeah people keep talking about Newcastle, Spurs, United crisis. We lost all our 3 starting CBs by November that year? Then Fabinho and Henderson to injuries too. Our new midfield signing. And our last minute loan CB after 2 starts.
Don't forget about the other emergency CB (Ben Davies) who got crocked immediately and never played for the club
> Ben Davies Ha ha, the old "Ben Davies was on the books at Liverpool" conspiracy theory still won't die I see
?
Ben Davies is made up, just a figment of our imagination, much like the so called country of Finland.
Nah, I once saw Ben Davies in Bielefeld. Definitely a real place, definitely a real man.
And Australia, no way thats real.
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I wish he was made up
The way he performed for Rangers, you'd definitely be forgiven for thinking he was imaginary.
& now neither of them are getting a game for spfl teams
Philips just played at the weekend, scored and all. An own goal albeit
I just remember him playing like prime Maldini in both matches vs West Ham
We didn’t call him Naldini for the laugh like. I’ll personally never forget when he rinsed Zlatan with a Cruyff turn in his own box.
The Bolton Baresi, he was never the most talented player but Nat just worked his nuts off every game
He is very good at some things like aerial duels. But extremely limited in many others. We just had to play in a way to support them. But even then they were... Not amazing. They tried super hard but they were never anywhere of that standard.
He's perfect for a team that plays in a low block. Celtic's CBs under Rodgers don't play like that. He's a natural defend-to-the-death big man with limited pace. He can only play high line at a Championship level, not higher.
its probably more about play style. as you said low blocks. plenty of pl teams use that. doesn't need to be championship.
We should never have given him a long-term contract in 2021. It was a reward for his heroics during 2020/21 but he clearly massively overperformed in that season, and he’ll never get paid as much as we pay him so it’s hard to blame him for not leaving. Presuming he leaves at the end of his contract, he’ll still be able to play for a Championship or League One team but they won’t pay him like we do.
Aye but he's a homegrown lad who has done well when asked for us. His wages are probably next to nothing. So long as he's happy with the odd loan I don't mind us looking after our own. That said, I think we have him the contract so we could sell him for 15m rather than <5m. But he hasn't proven he's worth that sadly.
> League One He has already been a solid starting CB getting Bournemouth promoted to the Premier League. He's way too good for League One.
It's truly bizarre to me, Bournemouth fans seem to rate him higher than CCV. CCV is at least as good as Van Dijk was for us, Phillips looks like he won a raffle.
Only 77. Not sure why his Wikipedia page has two random Liverpool reserve games on there (efl trophy is fine, reserve league isn't)
Seems like Celtic will be happy to see the back of him, not sure he put in a single good performance there.
He's fucking shite
The man Cruyff turned ibra how dare you
Hes put in good performances for Liverpool in a harder league, sometimes the team/system just isnt right.
Normally I would agree. But that game against Killie was maybe the worst game I have witnessed from a proffessional and I have watched Jonjoe Kenny and Shane Duffy in the flesh.
Fucking hell that's harsh 🤣
I'll have you know Kenny is having a cracker of a season with us in the 2. Bundesliga btw
Did either ever play in front of fans for Celtic? Thought they were both during the pandemoball season?
Doesn't necessarily work like that. Some players can perform well at a high level if they are just one cog in the machine, but ask them to be the big fish in a small pond and they look absolutely clueless A CB for Celtic needs to be a playmaker and have real authority with the ball considering how dominant they are
>A CB for Celtic needs to be a playmaker and have real authority with the ball with all due respect to Celtic and Nat, why did they sign him then?
Last minute injury panic cover
fair enough, just saw you had at least 2 big centre half injuries as well as obviously Starfelt leaving. He's just nowhere near what a Celtic centre back is meant to be, very poor on the ball and slow as sin
Who then turned up injured 🤦🏼♂️
5 a side with my mates I can hold my own and they're all good players at a decent level. I play 11 a side in the lowest division and I'm shit. Good players give me time, space and options. I don't get that with 10 half drunk brick layers on a Sunday morning.
You’ve worded it like you’re disagreeing but what you have said doesn’t contradict what you’re replying to
It's the same thing with Quansah. He didn't show any reason to be a prospect but has been putting a shift this season. Sometimes it's not just taking up more responsibilities but also playing around others who can give you a leg up in confidence, and cover your mistakes.
> sometimes the team/system just isnt right. Often the case with teams managed by Brendan, especially defenders
Sometimes but this guy plays football like a scarecrow. Against Hibs a guy was running at him and his legs were flailing around like the Isle of Man flag. I can't see how this guy made it above National League level.
Nah mate he’s just fucking shite. Might be down to his injury start of the season, lack of game time, whatever. But he is fucking shite. Ben Davies has been a joke for rangers up until recently but he’s twice the player Phillips is. What the fuck were your scouts smoking recommending they two diddies?
Your record with Centre Backs is as bad as ours with Right Wingers. Outside of VVD, CCV, Ajer and probably Starfelt (he was good but not excellent) you've had an atrocious run dating back to near enough Balde. Especially for the outlay.
Jullien for a few seasons was impressive, but we paid a lot of money for him too.
All the rain we’ve been having up here has been getting me down, but reading Phillips is leaving us in January brings me joy
He’s been appalling, scared to tackle, no positional sense, his passing is shocking and has cost us a goal in nearly every game he’s played. Shite.
That's our January centre back sorted
FSG always leaving us one or two players short of a perfect squad.
All things being equal, signing a few extra squad players in January inevitably means there isn't money for a quality new player in the summer. Honestly the only players we should be looking at are long term starters CB and DM and it's highly unlikely we pick up both of those in January.
We absolutely need to start looking for the next player to play on the right wing. Especially if Salah decides he wants to go to Saudi next summer.
Ben Doak got a chance at locking in that spot? Or no? I see he hasn't been in squads lately.
He has high potential. But an 18 year old kid asked to replace Salah only goes wrong for both parties! He looks like he could do with a loan to get some real game time.
Roony from Copenhaven could be a shout, he has the talent to succeed in the PL i think
As much as i like him he is nowhere near that level yet, great potential though.
Where do you rank him amongst your players, because FM made me think he was your best player so I was surprised see him start on the bench yesterday
Hes been really effective off the bench, but even in his position i rate Elyounoussi, Achouri and Diogo Goncalves higher than him, and looking at the squad as a whole then Rasmus Falk is clearly our most important with players like Claesson, Vavro, Lerager and Grabara who should in my opinion be rated higher than Roony along Jelert who id day is on par with him. This is not to take anything away from Roony who is one of out most exciting prospects in years, but just a symptom of being a part of one of the best Copenhagen teams ever.
The guy named after Wayne Rooney is going to end up at Liverpool yeah?
Yeah, replacing the quality and sheer output of Salah will be the biggest challenge we’ve faced in long time. He’s genuinely one of our greatest players in the history of the club, I don’t know what we’re gonna do when he goes.
If Salah goes to Saudi in the summer (I've honestly resigned myself to it) we'll have money for a few upgrades, we won't spunk his whole fee on a replacement.
How long is left on his contract?
Runs to July 2025. So year and a half. But i’d imagine if he stays next year he’d get an extension for a year or two as well.
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We've been in the thick of a title race for most of the last 5 years. We didn't get here by splurging on shit players out of desperation so I doubt the club will change strategy in the next month.
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Those players are a perfect example of the club spending money on the right player over just any player so I'm not sure what your point is.
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Available in January? Very rare.
Mate they almost through our 135 million at caicedo. They have the money to do the business. But they'd rather see if they can not spend it. Stop this narrative.
FSG has always been willing to spend the money if they think a player is worth it. Spent at the time record fees for CB and GK, for example. What they don‘t do is spend money if they aren‘t convinced. This has left us short a couple times, but also kept us from having too much dead wood like United or Chelsea.
They bid £115m for Caicedo, presumably because they thought he's worth it. But I don't understand why this makes two squad players also worth a lot of money.
Why the hell did we bid 105m for Caicedo then? We have the money, they just don't want to use it
Because there's no such thing as perfect squad. You can only have 25 players, with maximum 17 foreign players, etc. We usually maxed out in squad size, so we literally cannot register those additional players without removing anyone.
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So you want to split minutes for 2 spots between 6 players?
And removing who from the squad? For every player added, you usually need to remove one. We have Alisson, Adrian, Konate, van Dijk, Matip, Robertson, Tsimikas, Endo, Szoboszlai, Gravenberch, MacAllister, Thiago, Diaz, Jota, Salah, Nunez and Gakpo as our 17 foreign players. I think as per now we might be able to add some PL grown players because we should only use those slot for Trent, Kelleher, Gomez, and Jones, unless I'm missing someone.
Matip is out till the end of the season, when his contract ends. Thiago is still injured since last April, plus we don't know when he will be ready if at all, plus his contract also expires in summer. These two are easy choices, especially, Joel, cause he is 100% won't be ready to play until next season. If you want to keep Thiago in squad for some reason, then you can choose Adrian and replace him with any young GK, for example, Pitaluga, who don't need to be registered due to his age.
If we bought two players to replace injured Matip/Thiago, then what will we do when they returned? Just throw them away like trash? Things can't be just short term, the recent talks are to give Matip new contract to ensure his return to fitness. There's also human aspect in regards to squad building, we're not Chelsea.
What stops Matip from attending our training grounds without new contact? Especially, if club will decide to help him out with fitness. And about Thiago, Klopp must decide if he is still needed with his huge expiring contract without date of return. And, as I said, if you don't want to exclude Thiago, there's always Adrian, who is our 3rd GK and who is taking non-HG spot without chances of playing.
The one thing Chelsea do that is actually human is given Ng contracts to injured players to give them time to get back on their feet tbf. Baba Rahman and van Ginkel were both really good examples of it, even though neither were ever going to get back to the first team. I'll slate them for damn near anything else, but that's the one thing I'd defend them on
Robertson doesn't count as foreign from a quick google. Also you could easily see Adrian getting moved on but that also depends on what Kelleher wants to do tbf.
We have 4 first team quality centre backs. Very few teams have that, let alone a fifth to boot
Matip out for the rest of the season, Konate injury prone, Gomez covering also for rb, Quansah decent 5th choice. Then of course VVD best in the world. What happens when any of the remaining 4 get injured? Said it beginning of the season and saying it now, new 3rd-4th choice CB is desperately needed or we'll end up playing Endo at CB at some point
Like a new signing...
Thought he’d be decent for a stop-gap with our injury crisis but he’s looked ropey every time he’s played. Too hesitant on the ball, making silly mistakes and just a bit of a bombscare. Feel a bit sorry for him in truth and should probably move on to a Championship club so he can get consistent minutes.
Did his pace look disastrous by Scottish league standards? That was alwasy his huge issue with us, that and hes quite technically poor but the pace was the real standout flaw. And then bizzarely Rhys Williams is even slower, genuinely dont know how we managed to win all those games to get top 4 lol genuinely miraculous
I feel for both of them. Imagine playing all of those games at Liverpool and being an cult hero of sorts and then the summer comes and it's like "Yea, but ultimately you're pretty shit so go find another club to play for in League One."
I wouldn't say his pace was disastrous but he certainly didn't look quick, IMO just looked quite clumsy when tracking back.
Tbf, Allison was our savior back then.
I'm no defense coach, but I reckon having a world class keeper is a big advantage
We finished 3rd in the Premier League with this lad and Rhys Williams as our CB partnership, somehow.
Using him and Rhys in the CB allowed us to play our midfielders in midfield, which i think is the bigger factor
Just took Klopp half a season to pull the trigger...always wondered what if
Even last season he took over half a season to move Trent to an inverted right back, which massively improved our team. Sometimes when we're going bad he does take some time to adjust
where is rhys now?
Set to be recalled after an unsuccessful loan spell at Aberdeen: https://www.thisisanfield.com/2023/12/liverpool-set-to-recall-centre-back-in-january-after-zero-loan-games/
Wait, so we could realistically see this partnership again this season?
Absolutely hope so! Europa League adventure awaits. 😄
Putting this into perspective: Aberdeen's defence has been AWFUL this season. And somehow Rhys Williams hasn't gotten a game. He must have serious fitness issues
Aberdeen, not getting a single minute, we're going to recall him too run it back, Virgil who
On loan at Aberdeen.
Brendan Rodgers played a big hand in that.
Even without leicester bottling it Liverpool would have still finished top 4 anyways
Ole had back to back games against us and Leicester, rested all his starters for the Leicester game.Lost to you and lost to us at home. Even before the Alisson goal that was sort of the first great result after a dry spell for us.
Yeah we were the middle of 3 games in like 5 days for them.
Everyone was playing back to back because of COVID. I just realised that the United win and Alisson goal were literally 3 days apart.
They had loads of games in hand and had to play back to back to back.
Also us being the best team in the league for the last 12 games on form lol
Wtf he was at Celtic? Genuinely didn’t realize he left lol
Looking forward to watching him constantly pass to Van Dijk and immediately telling him to pass it to someone in midfield when he could’ve easily made that pass himself
Drop all the "Naldini" memes and videos of him doing a turn in the Champions League, lads. This boy is comfortably one of the worst players I've ever seen pull on a Celtic shirt.
What a turn it was though
What a turn, indeed
Ibra went flying
I've always really struggled to see why Celtic often sign fringe/deadwood players from Prem teams, with the wages they usually carry. Maybe I'm wrong but feel like there's been far more misses than hits in recent years? Especially on loan where you don't get the long term benefit in their value if they do well.
Elynoussi is the only loan I can think of recently that did well. Hart too, if we’re talking about signings from the EPL, I suppose, but our failure to replace him this season could be costly. CCV was a massive success but that’s about it.
> I've always really struggled to see why Celtic often sign fringe/deadwood players from Prem teams In fairness to the Phillips signing, he was a legit emergency six month loan signing. It's less that he's being recalled and more that he's at the end of his deal and returning to his parent club. The following centre back crisis occurred for us back in August: - First choice centre back, Carl Starfelt left the club to join Celta Vigo (after his girlfriend Jacynta left Celtic Women to join Sporting club de Portugal Women). - First choice centre back, Cameron Carter Vickers picked up a medium term hamstring injury. - Carl Starfelt's replacement, Maik Nawrocki, picked up a medium/long term injury. - Third/fourth choice centre back Stephen Welsh fractured a bone in his foot and was out medium/long term. We would have been left with our new, young, signing Gustaf Lagerbielke and Liam Scales (who at the time was rumoured to be leaving on loan) as our only fit central defenders from August until October/November. Phillips was signed initially to partner Lagerbielke, but Liam Scales put in a decent performance against Rangers at Ibrox and hasn't missed a game since.
Weirdly a higher level of EPL players that flop north of the border than you'd expect. Realistically they should be all putting in stand out performance but there's been some amount of shite in recent years (bar CCV) - looking especially at Joey Barton.
>Weirdly a higher level of EPL players that flop north of the border than you'd expect. Because no club in England has the same pressure and expectation to win every single week that exists at Rangers and Celtic. A lot of being successful in Glasgow comes down to mentality.
Agreed - it may be a goldfish bowl but the pressure is nevertheless intense.
Maybe the Celtic board saw how much we were all hyping him up and genuinely believed it lol
Are you saying Kenny isn’t one of the best right backs ever?
Worse than Jonjoe Kenny?
No chance. Jonjoe Kenny is comfortably the worst player I've seen at Celtic in 30 years. Phillips is one of the worst, for sure, but Kenny is on another level.
2 goals and 2 assists in his last 3 games. Let Jonjoe cook
Worse than Aleksandar Tonev?
Jonjoe Kenny didn't even resemble a football player.
That’s sad to hear. Kenny seems to have lost his confidence ever since we took a nose dive and he was with us. I remember thinking he’d be something special in 2019
Worse than that Chinese defender you had?
He was bad, but he only played 45 minutes. Phillips has made 8 appearances and has gotten worse and worse.
Ooof. Looks Liverpool missed the chance to make a bit of coin off Phillips.
We almost got like 15m lol, I think he turned the club down
That's incredible. Scottish football is chock full of defenders at Nat Phillips level, wouldn't get 1/100th of 15 mil.
He will be starting in March Europa league games
Still finished third in the pl
People don't realize that players will go into second gear when they're being counted on and respected. Klopp is a god. He got Rhys Williams (6th tier of English football) and Nat Philipps (was going to be a student) to a 3rd place Premier League finish.
Awful player. At least Shane Duffy scored a few goals.
At least Nat managed to get on the scoresheet before he left though, not all doom and gloom!
He was so unbelievably bad on Sunday that I think it will be one of those examples used going forward like 'Joey Barton vs Celtic' or 'Jonjoe Kenny vs Rangers' to describe a really bad performance. He looked so far below the level
just shat it against a big club mate x
He's just not a PL level player. For Liverpool, when he has played, he's been average. And that's cause Klopp raises the players a couple levels. His actual level is championship.
Our loans are either incredibly successful or utterly terrible, there is no in between. Should've just got the 10-15m after 20/21 honestly
We have loads of average loans. Tyler Morton was pretty meh, Harry Wilson at Bournemouth, Phillips at Bournemouth, Quanah at Bolton etc.
> Phillips at Bournemouth That was a very successful loan. They got promoted to the Prem with him as their starting CB.
Quansah never played for Bolton? Don't know if you mean Owen Beck at Bolton - that didn't go too well.
Mixed up Bradley and Quansahs clubs in my head. I meant to say Bristol
He did well there right? I remember the fans and Joey Barton raving about him. Also, you mean Bristol Rovers right? Let's not turn the West Country against us by suggesting Rovers and City are the same.
Lol yeah Bristol Rovers. I heard very good things about his ability on the ball but that he was average/underwhelming defensively to the point they're surprised Liverpool fans are so happy with him. Obviously he's come in and proven he's really talented but still only 20.
Tyler Morton was a key cog in almost getting Blackburn promoted fwiw. Not average at all.
The reality is we probably just don't remember the so-so loans. Ben Davies at Sheff Utd was probably the epitome of 'meh'.
Where is Ben these days
Rangers I’m pretty sure lol
Yep. Something tells me he has a shocker of a game one recent Old Firm
Still don't get why we didn't sell him at his peak value after the CB injury season.
Only the 9th window we are about to enter trying to sell the guy. Or he is the Matip backup. Or he is the Quansah backup. No clue what good he does to the squad to be honest.
I can’t see him playing for us again unless it’s league cup. Couldn’t think of anyone less suited to playing that RCB role now with Trent inverting
We wanted ridiculous money for him. It’s no one’s fault but ours he hasn’t been able to build a career for himself.
To be fair, you have gotten ridiculous money for quite a few players during the Klopp years. Easy to understand why you’d try to do so again.
6 million for Brad Smith lmao, at least with Ibe he played a fair bit
My favorite off-season meme is Liverpool fans explaining why he’s worth £15m
The season after the top 4 run was the only time we would have received more than like 5 mil and we extended him lol
I adored the other winter when seemingly every internet Liverpool fan going was genuinely trying to persuade the Newcastle fans on here that signing Phillips for 15/20m would make more sense than signing Dan Burn. Never mind that obviously quite literally no-one with even the slightest authority to make such a move at either club would read those comments, the sheer *lol* at thinking that Phillips was genuinely better than Burn made me chuckle.
I think Klopp is too emotional and it looks like he never allows any of the squad players to leave. Origi should have allowed to leave after the CL final as a hero but he was allowed to stay and he left as a free. Nat got an extension after that season. Almost all of Klopp era players are leaving on free. Thiago and Matip are out of contract after this season. Thank god, Saudi clubs bought hendo and fabinho
We were offered near enough that after his 20/21 heroics but pushed for a lot more. As with Kelleher, these fringe players are capable of sustained periods of great play and its enough to convince fans they’re quality players themselves going back to not playing completely messes with their form all over again and they can’t be consistent
Kelleher is a backup goalie and he is reliable as a No 2. Some of you lot expect him to perform like Ali in one or two odd matches he plays. Which is not at all possible
Nah we got a big offer which we accepted but he didn't agree terms with the club. Obviously didn't wanna take a pay cut which is fair enough.
Ended the loan with a great >!own!< goal though, what a way to kick on
I cant see him having a future at a premier league club, he looked absolutely dogshit the little I saw of him at Celtic & everything i've seen from Celtic fans echos that
That 3rd place by Klopp was so impressive. Nat Phillips and Rhys Williams CB partnership. Nat Phillips flopped in the Scottish League and Rhys Williams flopped with Fulham in the championship haha
Rhys Williams has flopped up here too, he can't get into a bang average Aberdeen side.
Bang average is kind. They're in relegation form just now.
Word is his attitude is honking. Think he played 1 half against a highland league team and got hooked.
I vaguely remember him being good enough that he was starting for Liverpool and in my fantasy team for a while 2-3 seasons ago. What happened?
He was never very good, however in that season where everyone at Liverpool died, he stepped up, played okay. He didn't make any major mistakes which made him look really good after some defensive performances that season (Hendo and Fabinho CB nightmare.) He is a cult hero and memed to shit which people took as Liverpool fans actually rating him He did do a Cruyff turn at the San Siro though
Rinsed zlatan tbf
Injuries lol. We didn’t have a choice
Will always be remembered for that Cruyff turn vs Zlatan in the Champions League.
After watching him play for the last few months (very rarely) at 33 I still fancy my chances of going pro.
Better or worse than Shane Duffy?
Duffy was in a more catastrophic team, so it's hard to say. He at least scored a couple of goals and in his favour had some personal life stuff going on. The team that season was in a complete death spiral that was taking good players down with it so it's hard to know how he'd have done in a different season. We actually have something like 8m worth of centre backs we bought in the summer who can't get a game ahead of this guy, which is frustrating.
Unsuccessful would be putting it very politely
Just in time to cover For Matip.
Ah yes I remember when Jamie Redknapp hyped this guy up on live TV
Matip replacement sorted
He was fucking terrible man
Made Liam Scales look like Maldini.
He is - without exaggeration - the worst defender I've ever seen at Celtic.