Signings of real quality are needed

Jun 7 2007 Red Watch by Andy Proudfoot, Liverpool Daily Post

THE Summer Transfer Window. That special time of year when birds burst into song, conkers fall off horse chestnut trees and UEFA heads of communications spout utter drivel.

When whole days are spent scouring the papers for a cherished snippet linking your favourite player with Liverpool, and obscure internet sites from Swaziland are quoted as authoritative sources that Ronaldinho is indeed interested in coming to Anfield, having been a lifelong admirer of John Arne Riise.

If Liverpool really were interested in all the players claimed by the various media sources, then we’d probably need to build a new training ground to accommodate them and rotation would reach tornado proportions.

All we can hope is that when the dust settles, we’ll be starting next season with the squad boosted by players of the quality we’ve largely been denied by financial constraints which, though hardly crippling, have prevented us competing for players in the £10-15m bracket, never mind the £17m that an Owen Hargreaves apparently commands these days.

So far progress has been less that spectacular.

The widely-touted arrival of Florent Malouda appears to be accepted by all but anybody at Lyon, who say they haven’t even heard from Liverpool.

Simao Sabrosa will probably be suffering from the bends from climbing on and off planes to John Lennon Airport; and even negotiations for George Gillett’s favourite, Snoogy Doogy, appear to have broken down.

It’s a familiar story for Liverpool fans, and probably lies at the root of Rafa’s outburst after the Champions’ League final about the speed at which the club appears to conduct these enquiries and negotiations.

Some reports would have us believe that current problems are down to mundane issues about lack of clarity over who can sign the cheques; plausible but hopefully so bizarre that not even Liverpool could conjure up such a situation.

Much more likely, I feel, is that our slothful approach is rooted in past habits to delay new signings as long as possible so that we don’t have to pick up the wages of new players until late July or August.

The folly of this approach will surely be recognised by the new owners, limiting as it does the opportunity to integrate the players into the Anfield set-up, thereby risking the sort of start to the season that has scuppered our Premiership chances in each of the last two seasons before Jose Mourinho can receive his first disciplinary punishment.

Assuming that we can find the chequebook, the onus then will be squarely on Rafa’s shoulders to spend his allowance wisely.

His record is at best patchy, though he would no doubt claim that when he’s been allowed to spend big, he’s largely pulled it off – Alonso and Kuyt being the obvious examples. In the mid-market, his success rate is much lower: for every Agger there’s a Morientes; for every Reina a Kromkamp.

We spent a lot of time and money on Gonzalez, assured that he would make an immediate impact, only to see him offloaded after one season.

Reports that the new owners have commissioned a report from a firm of accountants on the success of Rafa’s transfers are surely wide of the mark (though I’d be interested to hear their views on Pellegrino and Josemi) but if Rafa gets the resources he wants to spend big, he’s sure to increase the pressure on himself to identify the right players.

No doubt this is pressure he’ll welcome, assuming of course that pesky chequebook turns up.