Comolli Sacked

[G]

John Achterberg was also there,in his full training gear and sat on the bench with the rest of the staff

[marcus50bucks]

Cruyff recommends Barca guru Begiristain to Liverpool

Duncan Castles Published 15 April 2012

LIVERPOOL’S new director of football can expect to work on a summer transfer budget of £20m-£30m with recruitment focused on players under the age of 21. The club’s American owners, unhappy with spending under the joint stewardship of Kenny Dalglish and Damien Comolli, believe limited, targeted investment will re-establish Liverpool in the Champions League.

After aggressively dispensing with Comolli’s services as director of football last week, the Fenway Sports Group (FSG) approached Johan Cruyff to discuss replacements, receiving a recommendation that they appoint Txiki Begiristain, a former Barcelona sporting director. Begiristain, interviewed by Roman Abramovich for a similar position at Chelsea, left Camp Nou in 2010 when Joan Laporta stepped down as president.

Cruyff is understood to have no interest in a full-time appointment at Liverpool. His protégé, Begiristain, had been optimistic of being offered employment at Manchester City if another former Barcelona executive, Ferran Soriano, was made chief executive.

An alternative option for Liverpool is Louis van Gaal, the former Ajax, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Holland coach, who has been pushing his own credentials to restructure Liverpool. Begiristain, who won the European Cup as a Barcelona player when Cruyff was head coach, had a mixed record of recruitment at Camp Nou. Although deals that brought in Dani Alves, Yaya Toure and Gerard Pique would prove important, nearly £58m was wasted on Dmytro Chygrynskiy, Henrique, Keirrison, Martin Caceres and Alexander Hleb.

In summer 2009, on Begiristain’s watch, the club failed to sign David Villa, who eventually arrived a year later, and instead replaced the outgoing striker Samuel Eto’o with Zlatan Ibrahimovic, paying Inter Milan more than £41m for the Swede. Ibrahimovic left for AC Milan a year later for less than half that fee.

Though Dalglish guided Liverpool to their first trophy in six seasons by winning the Carling Cup in February, FSG have been unhappy with league displays — and John W Henry and chairman Tom Werner decided to sack Comolli after less than 18 months at the club. Comolli was caught unawares when told on Wednesday he was leaving.

Unhappy with the quality of senior academy players, Liverpool have begun to implement Werner’s strategy “to build a strong system under the first team”. In addition to young foreign imports, he hopes to recruit uncontracted teenagers from Football League academies at low, fixed fees.

Before watching his team earn a place in their second final of the season with a 2-1 FA Cup semi-final win over Everton yesterday, Dalglish admitted that he had made mistakes — particularly over the racism row between Liverpool striker Luis Suarez and Manchester United’s Patrice Evra in October. Suarez was banned for eight matches and Dalglish said: “It would be done completely differently if it ever happened again — and I hope it never does.”

http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/sport/football/Premiership/article1017180.ece

Tixi is definitely more suited to the dof role than Gaal and Cruyff.

[Fosterbloke]

Ibrahimovic played well for Barcelona so it's a bit harsh to criticise Begiristain for that.

We could be the next Barcelona which suits the pass and move ethos perfectly

[dww]

I don't think it is the player selection so much as the fact that there doesn't seem to be much evidence of negotiating fees down which is a concern with that one. It's not clear to me how much of the DoF role will be to do with first team purchases though.

[colin85]

Arsene wenger, would he be suited to a dof role and what are the chances of us knicking him from arsenal?

[dww]

Arsene wenger, would he be suited to a dof role and what are the chances of us knicking him from arsenal?

My answers
Possibly, when he's tired of managing.
There aren't any.

[cream]

Tixi's record is very much mixed really when it comes to senior players. Not sure what he's like with youth players, which is most important to us as it seems. I've always thought (especially after recent big money failures) that we will go aggressively down the young player market and look to build something special for the future, the short term hasn't worked out for us unfortunately.

[Zapater]

Yep, although we have to remember that his record at Barcelona would be very different than it would be for us. It's very specific, and many of the "flops" he brought in have come good elsewhere.

As I said earlier though, Monchi in that kind of mould has real appeal for me. I know it'll never happen. He went off the boil in his last 2 seasons at Sevilla, but he signed guys like Alves, Baptista, Maresca, Keita, Palop, Navarro, Kanoute, Fabiano, Adriano, Escude and other great players for absolute peanuts. They either were sold for much much greater fees or gave a graet deal to the club.

Obviously on the other hand he signed flops (some of them expensive) like de Mul, Hinkel, Konko, Kone (scoring at Levante), Romaric and others but overall, his dealings were responsible of turning the club into something competitive. As they used to say for those few seasons - everything he touched turned to gold.

[DannyMan2006]

The task was simple.

Identify the best up and coming talents in British football and sign them at reduced fees before they make it big.

Dalglish rightly identified Henderson & Carroll as fitting that mould.

But Commoli ****ed up by paying over the odds for them. Instead of paying reduced fees, he paid inflated fees. And that's why he's out the door.

[Fosterbloke]

The task was simple.

Identify the best up and coming talents in British football and sign them at reduced fees before they make it big.

Dalglish rightly identified Henderson & Carroll as fitting that mould.

But Commoli ****ed up by paying over the odds for them. Instead of paying reduced fees, he paid inflated fees. And that's why he's out the door.

Makes a lot of sense to me. It's not the players per se, but rather the money spent on them.

If we halved the fees involved I think most people would say they've been quite successful.

[cream]

Problem was, Carroll was always going to come with an inflated fee, we just went stupid and paid a ridiculous fee, he didn't really fit in to that policy.

[Assassin]

Problem was, Carroll was always going to come with an inflated fee, we just went stupid and paid a ridiculous fee, he didn't really fit in to that policy.

You and others would be better off forgetting the fee. We paid what we paid to buy a player we wanted. End of story

[Craig_H]

You and others would be better off forgetting the fee. We paid what we paid to buy a player we wanted. End of story

Unfortunately though, cream has an agenda so it wont stop.

[cream]

You and others would be better off forgetting the fee. We paid what we paid to buy a player we wanted. End of story

We weren't talking about Carrolls actual fee.

[Alex]

I still don't see why a transfer fee has any bearing on a players ability. Why is it used as a stick to beat them. Transfer fees should be the concern of senior management. Not the manager or the player concerned. But all I ever hear with Big Andy is how much he cost.