Will Liverpool learn from Tottenham's big money mistakes?

18 July 2014 15:47

Last summer we saw Tottenham, with Andre Villas Boas at the helm, waste the transfer budget proceedings from the Gareth Bale transfer to Real Madrid. Here is a run-down of the big money spending from spurs last year:

Erik Lamela - £30 Million, Roberto Soldado - £26 Million, Paulinho - £17 Million, Christian Eriksen - £11.5 Million, Etienne Capoue - £9 Million, Vlad Chiriches – £8.5 Million, Nacer Chadli - £7 Million.

With the only possible exceptions being Eriksen, Chiriches and maybe Paulinho, these signing are seen as a major mistake in trying to immediately replace Gareth Bale with a bunch of unproven players. The poor performances from Lamela, Chadli and Soldado mainly impacted Tottenham’s results on the pitch and ultimately led to Villas Boas’ sacking.

The question is will Brendan Rodgers and Liverpool learn from the mistakes the North London club made last season? With Luis Suarez being sold to Barcelona for a reported £75 Million, and Liverpool qualifying for the champions league next season, Rodgers is said to have around £100 million to spend to bolster the squad for the oncoming campaign.

So far, Liverpool have bought Adam Lallana for £25 million, Lazar Markovic for £20 million, Emre Can for £8 Million and Rickie Lamber for £4 million. Lallana is a quality signing, a real English talent and a great addition I’m sure. If Lambert can score 10 goals plus most likely from the bench then this will be regarded as a bargain too. As for Can and Markovic, these are two young European players unproven in the Premier League. In my opinion Markovic is overpriced if you look at his stats for Benfica he actually had an inferior season than any of Liverpool’s wingers last year.

Liverpool have already had a failed bid for Alexis Sanchez, with the Chilean opting to join Arsenal instead. Transfer gossip for Liverpool revolves around Divock Origi, the young Belgian who made a huge impact for his national team at the World Cup. In addition Dejan Lovren has been linked with the squad to strengthen Liverpool’s defensive frailties. With Columbia’s star looking bound for Real Madrid, Rodgers has been put on alert with young Spanish midfielder Isco perhaps on his way out of the Bernabeu. I’m not sure the absence of Suarez can be filled up front, even though Loic Remy has been linked, this would not be a sufficient enough replacement. Marco Reus would be a real statement of intent from Rodgers if he was signed as transfer rumours suggest, but whether this is possible only the hierarchy at Anfield can know.

With the transfer window closing in under a month and a half, Rodgers resolve will be tested in the transfer market. Previous mistakes of big money signings like Andy Carroll and Stewart Downing will not be repeated. But whether Rodgers can replace the void of the world class Uruguayan up front, who aided Liverpool to challenge for the Premier League title and get them into the top elite European competition, will be answered in the next 6 weeks.

Source: DSG