General Premier League Thread 2023-24 Mod Note in op 27/6/23 And 21/05/24

Edited out cause of mod comment.

In a way, he's always been 32

Matip and Thiago are both wrong side of 30, on good wages, are non-homegrown, had contracts expire last week, and missed nearly an entire season just gone.

Not surprised to see either of them leave. The 3rd player in a similar boat is Adrián and I'm surprised that he's renewing his contract. I mean, I get why he's staying, he's basically like another coach and I'm guessing he's dirt cheap, but it's not like he's going to play.

A bunch of academy players also got released today, Musialowski and Frauendorf the notable names - both have played for the first team before.

Next set of players to look at will be the players returning from loan - Carvalho, Ramsay, Beck, Chambers, Koumetio, Jaros, Pitaluga, Phillips, Williams, Morton, van den Berg, Arroyo

They can't keep all of them as only 2 of these players still qualify as u21 for squad purposes.

I feel a lot of Liverpool's summer business is going to be sales and loans out of these sort of players with just a couple of incomings

Liverpool may have offered Matip a 1 year deal but he probably wants a 3 year deal. I was saying to my mates that Matip is worth a hold for a year while they try and sell/replace Konate.

Which players coming off season long injuries, over the age of 33, did they re-sign to brand new contracts this summer? Or in previous summers?

I don’t think he’s at the level required. Look at what the joke of a physical specimen Calvert Lewin did to him. And Klopp took him off and didn’t really pick him after that. He gives away too many fouls in really dangerous areas. Also, he plays like he’s brain dead at times. Matip is superior to him.

If Matip hadn't blown his knee I'd be fairly sure he'd have got another 12 months.

Thiago did well this year replacing Kieta as the permacrock midfielder. So thats a vacancy that'll need filling.

The primary issue with Konate is his fitness, he misses a lot of games every season. Only 51 league appearances in 3 seasons at Liverpool, 66 league appearances in 4 seasons at Leipzig.

I’m not saying he isn’t a good 4th choice CB. He’s definitely that. But there are too many issues with him. That’s why I’d sell. And your post means we’d command a good fee for doing so.

Konate actually had a very good injury record this season, given his history. The longest run of games that he missed this season was 3 (in 7 days) in 3 different competitions in March.

Liverpool played 58 games last season. Konate was in the match day squad for 50 of those, missing 1 through suspension and 7 through injury.

He did play in 37 of those 50 games. Sometimes this was because others were selected such as Matip himself, giving time to Quansah/Gomez in the cups etc. but Konate usually started in 1 of the 2 games every week, and when Liverpool were so heavy on fixtures there was bound to be rotation to keep everyone a bit fresher.

Konate was actually a very consistent player for the most of the season. He picked up a knock just before the March international break and then was rushed back to play for France and the full 90 mins. Although his fitness appeared to be there, he never recovered full form after that and was eventually dropped fully for Quansah and the April/May time was the only time of the season when Konate was out of the team completely. Before that he was a big player in defence for Liverpool who had a fairly strong defensive record for the most of the season. For long periods, they had basically the same number of goals conceded as Arsenal who were being talked about as this defensive rock of a team.

It looks like Deschamps has decided on Konate starting for France in the Euros too.