if our funds are as limited as we fear

[rage]

ok so my fear is that many of us think we have no way got enough money to buy who we need to compete. Now without getting into a debate I'm sure than Rafa will have 25 odd million minimum, even if thats raised by player sales.

If this is the case and we continue to play 4231 i'd love to see:

- Gerrard moved back into central midfield and our limited funds to be spent on second striker/playmaker and a right sided midfielder instead of buying barry. (Crouch and Pennant raise an easy 10 million)

- have a central midfield of Gerrard, Masch, Lucas and one of the youth/ reserve team Plessis for example (I'm presuming Alonso will go so there's an easy 10 million)

- the fullback positions to be filled by arbeloa, insua, aurellio & carragher and the bosman signing. (selling Finnan % Riise raise 3 million minimum)

There's no point moaning about not having enough money, i'd even be tempted to blow the budget on one signing and bide our time. it can be done and we can compete. Surely the sign of a great manager is being able to win things without having to spend the most money?

Will Rafa make the most of what he has and spend his money this way or will he always have the fall back option of saying we can't compete because we don't have enough money?

[keniget]

If we're skint, there is no point padding out the squad with crap. Spend well on one or two players and make do with what we have.

We can sign players like Menez and Drenthe for 10M a piece, who would improve our wide play immensely. Or substitute one for Bentley, for all the "Prem Proven" advocates.

If we start signing run of the mill midfielders, defenders and bosman attackers - we may see an incremental improvement, but the teams around us will improve more.

[Big Dave]

Will Rafa make the most of what he has and spend his money this way or will he always have the fall back option of saying we can't compete because we don't have enough money?

If you look at the squad that we have to start with for next season, I really don't think that Rafa can use money as an excuse for next season. With the players we can offload this Summer (Pennant / Riise / Crouch / Carson), we should be able to raise a good few quid added to the kitty we "should" have will more than suffice for Rafa to get the majority of his first choice targets.

I'm pretty confident that we can compete next season. We're only a couple of results away from being right in the hunt.

[dww]

I'm not sure why anyone would believe given Rafa's recent chipper demeanor and our last 12 months purchases that we will be that hard up this summer. But in terms of squad improvements that would be low cost and potentially have a large impact.

There are genuine improvements that can be made for little or no nett cost such as Degen and Bridge in and Riise out.

There are a number of players who will go and the obvious one to start with is Kewell who will bring in no money from a sale but will free up £100k a week which isn't to be sniffed at. Carson will in all likelihood be sold and this will have no real impact in the squad (most change likely in the GK department of the match day squad is Itandje out new free keeper in IMO).

The other players who would be offloaded would have to be replaced in the squad (not necessarily directly) if we sold them. I would expect Pennant, Voronin, Finnan, Benayoun and sadly Crouch to be on the good offers considered list.

The replacement for Finnan would obviously be the afore mentioned Degen.

I would then pool all the money to buy one or two pacy, exciting, forward players of the flexible can play anywhere across the front line type (think of Ronaldo/Babel/Walcott in terms of tactical utility) - any number of names of players I haven't seen much of have been mentioned but I won't comment. Wouldn't object to one of them being Bentley either.

I actually would quite like to add the flexibility and dynamism of Barry to midfield. Would give interesting options in terms of him playing a centrally inclined left mid in a 4-4-2 (hopefully we won't be seeing 3-5-1 formations as an alternative anymore) and to have a more mobile central duo in the 4-2-3-1 formation. He would not be a priority to me.

[spud_gun]

If we're skint, there is no point padding out the squad with crap. Spend well on one or two players and make do with what we have.

Hopfully Rafa will proceed down this road. No point spending £5m on Benayoun and £7m on Pennant et al and padding out the squad when what's really needed is one or two very good positional players.

[Exiled_red]

If we only have limited funds IMO best course of action is to buy one big player and only replace what *has* to be replaced

[JPK]

If we're skint, there is no point padding out the squad with crap. Spend well on one or two players and make do with what we have.

We can sign players like Menez and Drenthe for 10M a piece, who would improve our wide play immensely. Or substitute one for Bentley, for all the "Prem Proven" advocates.

If we start signing run of the mill midfielders, defenders and bosman attackers - we may see an incremental improvement, but the teams around us will improve more.

Well said.

[Skillz]

Surely the sign of a great manager is being able to win things without having to spend the most money?

Will Rafa make the most of what he has and spend his money this way or will he always have the fall back option of saying we can't compete because we don't have enough money?

Rafa is currently in the black on players he has bought and sold. LFC still pays Le Tallec a wage. Yep, he took the option of a year on top of the five we have already paid him. 6 years he got from Parry/Houllier.

If you want to have a go at Harry, surely this bloke has been more disappointing.

[rage]

Rafa is currently in the black on players he has bought and sold. LFC still pays Le Tallec a wage. Yep, he took the option of a year on top of the five we have already paid him. 6 years he got from Parry/Houllier.

If you want to have a go at Harry, surely this bloke has been more disappointing.

not having a go at anyone. i just want to move away from the world of excuses. lets face it unless we're utd or chelsea we can't have everyone we want. it looks as though we'll have 20-30 million from player sales, i want that money to be used most effectively - no point saying i needed 10 million more etc.

i've come to realise that some things are out of our control and the mark of a good manager is his ability to compete inspite of our financial limitations. average grant is not a great manager but its easier for him because he has access to so much resources. rafa is a great manager and can prove it by competing for the premiership inspite of not having the cash to compete with chelsea or utd.

[DannyMan2006]

ok so my fear is that many of us think we have no way got enough money to buy who we need to compete. Now without getting into a debate I'm sure than Rafa will have 25 odd million minimum, even if thats raised by player sales.

If this is the case and we continue to play 4231 i'd love to see:

- Gerrard moved back into central midfield and our limited funds to be spent on second striker/playmaker and a right sided midfielder instead of buying barry. (Crouch and Pennant raise an easy 10 million)

- have a central midfield of Gerrard, Masch, Lucas and one of the youth/ reserve team Plessis for example (I'm presuming Alonso will go so there's an easy 10 million)

- the fullback positions to be filled by arbeloa, insua, aurellio & carragher and the bosman signing. (selling Finnan % Riise raise 3 million minimum)

There's no point moaning about not having enough money, i'd even be tempted to blow the budget on one signing and bide our time. it can be done and we can compete. Surely the sign of a great manager is being able to win things without having to spend the most money?

Will Rafa make the most of what he has and spend his money this way or will he always have the fall back option of saying we can't compete because we don't have enough money?

Can't argue much with that. Other than Carra being in my first choice CB pairing. Though as you say, he could cover in an emergency.

I believe we now have the depth in squad to compete, just lack a bit of quality to go all out. Bringing in one or two "first teamers" would raise us another level.

I'm presuming this Deggen is better than any of our current RB so that's one improvement. a RW would be another addition I would like. Then it's a choice of who to replace if Xabi goes. Do we switch Gerrard (which I would prefer) to CM, or leave him where he is.

It would all depend on who's avaiable for me. No point in buying a second rate CM or a second rate "in the hole" type player.

But a midfiled of Gerrard and Mascher, with Babel on one wing and Bentley on the other, and then Pandev in the hole with Torres up top would be unreal. I'd rather have Joaquin/Quaresma for the wing and Augero for in the hole but I thought I'd go with a bit of realism.

[Skillz]

not having a go at anyone. i just want to move away from the world of excuses. lets face it unless we're utd or chelsea we can't have everyone we want. it looks as though we'll have 20-30 million from player sales, i want that money to be used most effectively - no point saying i needed 10 million more etc.

i've come to realise that some things are out of our control and the mark of a good manager is his ability to compete inspite of our financial limitations. average grant is not a great manager but its easier for him because he has access to so much resources. rafa is a great manager and can prove it by competing for the premiership inspite of not having the cash to compete with chelsea or utd.

He will.

[MascheredUp]

If we're skint, we've got **** all chance of finishing any higher than fourth place next season.

The Mancs and Chelsea will get their cheque books out again.

We'll fall further and further behind.

[Skillz]

If we're skint, we've got **** all chance of finishing any higher than fourth place next season.

The Mancs and Chelsea will get their cheque books out again.

We'll fall further and further behind.

If we keep Rafa we will get closer, no?

[El Jefecito]

ok so my fear is that many of us think we have no way got enough money to buy who we need to compete. Now without getting into a debate I'm sure than Rafa will have 25 odd million minimum, even if thats raised by player sales.

If this is the case and we continue to play 4231 i'd love to see:

- Gerrard moved back into central midfield and our limited funds to be spent on second striker/playmaker and a right sided midfielder instead of buying barry. (Crouch and Pennant raise an easy 10 million)

See I don't think SG is tactical or disciplined enough to play in the 2 without distorting the shape. So I'd actually move him out to Kuyt's position and tell him to stay there. You wont find a better player in the world in that role and certainly not for the kind of money we have (alledgedly).

Agree we then need someone for the hole, I think there a few of them about though. Not sure if they would adapt but I'm thinking players like, VDV, Deco, Modric, Ben Arfa, Pandev, Menez etc.

- have a central midfield of Gerrard, Masch, Lucas and one of the youth/ reserve team Plessis for example (I'm presuming Alonso will go so there's an easy 10 million)

Given that I've just lashed SG out onto the wing we need 1 more if Xabi goes. Barry will do a job and I think will perform better with us as the role in the 2 suits his game.

- the fullback positions to be filled by arbeloa, insua, aurellio & carragher and the bosman signing. (selling Finnan % Riise raise 3 million minimum)

I'd much rather have a couple of FBs whose strengths are on the attacking end of the game. Our FBs are all defensive minded. Our wingers tend to cut in and so you need FBs to provide the width. Alves

There's no point moaning about not having enough money, i'd even be tempted to blow the budget on one signing and bide our time. it can be done and we can compete. Surely the sign of a great manager is being able to win things without having to spend the most money?

Will Rafa make the most of what he has and spend his money this way or will he always have the fall back option of saying we can't compete because we don't have enough money?

Let's see what the others do in the transfer market, they really are the key to how far behind them we will be next season. Unfortunately, Rafa only controls 1/4 of the equation.

[Shaggy]

If our funds are as limited as we fear...........then we should turn to our reserve side.

Cases could be made for Nemeth, Plessis, Insua, San Jose, Huth and Darby.

Pacheco the season after.