by CardinalRed » Sat Jun 01, 2013 9:08 pm
Compelling arguments on Football 365.com.....
"Should Liverpool take this opportunity to cash in on their most valuable asset, or cling on to their best player? Here are the arguments for and against.
Sell him?
Luis Suarez has, quite frankly, become a liability. He has received bans totalling 19 games in his time in England (which isn't counting one carried over from a suspension in Holland when he arrived) without ever being sent off. He is, if nothing else, creative about how he makes himself unavailable for Liverpool.
The point about his status as a liability is that it's entirely unpredictable, the biting incident occurred on the day an interview was published in which he said he was watching how he behaved on the pitch. Liverpool, frankly, have no idea what stupid thing he's going to do next.
Of course, lots of brilliant players are unpredictable, so why would Liverpool sell their most talented striker and top-scorer? The easy answer to that is that he is not as crucial to the side as you might think - while statistics like this are flawed, Liverpool's win ratio with him in the side is 39%, while it is 62% without him. The latter figure probably has too low a sample size to be truly reliable, but it does at least illustrate that Liverpool are not fumbling in the dark without Suarez. They won three of the four games after his suspension at the end of the season, producing arguably their most impressive performance (the demolition of Newcastle) in the process, with Daniel Sturridge scoring five times. Indeed the ever marvellous Opta Joe tweeted recently that 'Without Luis Suarez's goals this season, Liverpool would still have finished seventh in the Premier League table. Depth.'
American writer Bill Simmons is fond of 'The Ewing Theory', the basic concept of which you'll be familiar with - when a team loses a star player upon whom they have seemingly be reliant, said team actually becomes a better 'team'. Of course, that theory has rather inconsistent examples to back it up, but in this case it could apply. If the evidence of the second half of last season is anything to go by, in Sturridge Liverpool potentially have a player to take the goal-scoring burden away from Suarez, and in Phillipe Coutinho a player to replace his creativity.
In any case, losing your best player is not necessarily a sign that the end is nigh. Borussia Dortmund have lost key men in recent years and have only been denied by potentially the next great side of this generation, while Spurs have sold the likes of Michael Carrick, Dimitar Berbatov, Luka Modric and Rafa van der Vaart, have rebuilt and have flourished.
Suarez's wastefulness is also a factor - he scored plenty of goals last season, but he also took a boatload of shots to get them. He had 187 attempts, the most in the Premier League and more than double the amount of Steven Gerrard, the next on Liverpool's list, and in three fewer games too. Even casual observers of Liverpool could tell you that in many of those shooting scenarios, a better-placed teammate was left frustrated and unused.
And then of course there's the money. The going rate for a player of Suarez's ability is around £50million, and with Real Madrid in all likelihood looking to make a transfer splash (they have a presidential election this summer, and will no doubt be smarting after missing out on Neymar), that's a perfectly realistic valuation. With that money, a team could be rebuilt. Liverpool need a new centre-back, possibly a new goalkeeper, maybe a midfielder/winger and another striker. With the £50million, plus any other cash they raise, they could be in quite a position.
Finally, keeping hold of Suarez this summer may simply be a case of delaying the inevitable. Suarez will, in all likelihood, want to leave Liverpool in the next few years, unless something extraordinary happens next season. Selling him now while his playing stock is still high may be the most prudent option. That said...
Keep him?
Selling one player for £50million and replacing him with three £15million-ish players is all well and good, but the simple fact remains that that Liverpool would be releasing one of the top talents in the world. When you have a gem, you do everything you can to hang onto him. On an individual basis, Suarez is irreplaceable - anyone available to Liverpool will be an inferior player, so at the most simplistic level, selling Suarez will make Liverpool's team worse.
In any case, if they get £50million for their man, can Liverpool be trusted to spend it wisely? Their recruitment policy of late has of course been rather better than in years past, but even if you forget that the people in charge are the same ones who spent around £25million on Joe Allen and Fabio Borini, all transfers are a risk. You don't know how a particular player will settle, so trading a sure thing (taking only on-field ability into account, at least) for gambles will be, well...a gamble.
And then of course one has to consider that Liverpool might not get £50million. The moment Suarez publically said he wanted to leave, his value diminished. The quick 'Not for sale' declaration did some good, but let us not forget that they have a 'tarnished' player on their hands. In terms of his talent Suarez is easily worth top dollar, but a prospective buyer could well factor in his unpredictability and the more unpleasant aspects of his character and adjust the fee accordingly. Indeed, initial reports suggest that Real Madrid won't go above £25million, which by rights should be laughed off the negotiating table, but they may feel that Suarez's words and actions put them in a stronger position. So if Liverpool cannot get a fee that reflects how valuable Suarez is to them, there seems little point in selling.
Indeed, if Liverpool need money to fix their squad, there are perhaps other sources for it. While they will make a loss on Andy Carroll, his transfer should bring in something like £15million, while Martin Skrtel and Pepe Reina (despite their declines in form) should also raise a few quid. If it comes to a straight choice of accepting £25million for Suarez, or around that figure for two or three of the players mentioned, it becomes something of a no-brainer.
Then we come to symbolism. Liverpool are of course trying, desperately trying, to regain their place in the Champions League, and from there return to the heights they reached before. So what sort of message would selling their best player send in that context? They will be unquestionably identified as a selling club - what if Coutinho, or Raheem Sterling, or even someone like Suso has a sensational 2013/14 but Liverpool still finish sixth? They will be known as a soft touch, a buffet for bigger and richer clubs, but if they dig in over Suarez, then this perception will be changed.
There's the fans as well. Danny Baker once said about Paul Gascoigne that players do not make crowds gasp these days, but he did. Suarez makes crowds gasp, and few excite a group of fans like he excites the Kop. This might appear unimportant and intangible, but it isn't. Having a player the fans can feel for, can look forward to watching rather than simply appreciating their functionality, is crucial in this age when the gap between crowd and player has never been wider. To paraphrase Danny Blanchflower, Liverpool have to win, but it's also important to do things in style, with a flourish, to go out and beat the other lot, not wait for them to die of boredom. You'll never die of boredom when Suarez is around. Most Liverpool fans recognise that he is basically a *****, but he's their ***** - every club either has or had one of those down the years, and it's something incredibly powerful.......
