Well it finally happened, Raheem Sterling got his wish of a move away from Liverpool to his beloved Manchester City for purely footballing reasons and this was not in any way decided on the financial package provided by City to the player.
To be honest, Liverpool knew Sterling was going to go away, they would have only hoped that he could have been sold to a club outside England but with Manchester City splashing £49 million on a 20-year-old, anyone would have been foolish not to take up the offer.
Sterling isn’t a Messi yet, but he has the potential to be one of the best players in England, his development took place at Liverpool and he could get even better at City, only time can be a judge of that. What we do know if Sterling will earn a ton of cash at City, he should have a better chance of winning trophies at the club and Liverpool have a cool £49 million to splash around and make their team better.
Money, money, money!
The first thing we need to clear up is that Liverpool will have to pay QPR, Sterling’s former club, around £8 million from the deal. This deal is £44 million + add ons depending on Sterling’s performances and City winning trophies in the future.
Technically, Liverpool would have only around £32 million to spend at the moment, which still is a good amount, especially after they already made 6 signings for their first team. The team still is not complete and it needs strengthening in certain areas, like defence.
Liverpool would have the likes of Mamadou Sakho, Dejan Lovren, Martin Skrtel and Kolo Toure for their first set of central defenders that really does not provide confidence for the team especially after last season’s debacle in defence. They need a central defender and a top one at that; will they get one for £20-30 million? Of course they can, the only issue would be, are they willing to come to a club without Champions League football?
The other region where they need to strengthen, even more after Sterling’s departure is the winger position, Liverpool might have a lot of options in hand with Ibe, Markovic and Lallana, but that still is not good enough for a team that needs to battle for a top 4 position. The rumours being circulated are about a certain Marco Reus being linked with a move to Anfield. That certainly would put the cat amongst the pigeons as Reus playing with Coutinho, Firmino and Sturridge could provide some real fireworks this season.
Liverpool have conducted their business fairly quickly this season, lessons have been learned from last time around and we fully expect a couple of signings or maybe one big signing from Rodgers before the end of the transfer window. It is do or die for him, so why not throw the dice and see how luck plays out?