Can Edwards Rebuild Liverpool Again?

After Jurgen Klopp's retirement, it was very welcome news that Michael Edwards was returning to Liverpool to help steer the club into a new era. 

However, after a massively successful debut season, this year has been bumpy. And upon further review, Liverpool's summer transfer window doesn't look quite as good as it did at the time. 

Which leads Matt and Jonny to ask this question:

It's pretty common for sequels to be underwhelming; often times second acts pale in comparison to the first. Can the Edwards regime fix what has broken this season?

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

You're listening to America's Anfield, the Liverpool FC podcast brought to you by American Brothers Matt and Johnny. From the heart of the U.S. to the COP, we're talking all things reds every week.

SPEAKER_00 0:22

What's good, everybody? You're listening to another episode of America's Anfield. Haven't forgotten about you guys. Matt and Johnny are here with you tonight. Um, we're not in a celebratory mood because Liverpool lost for the 13th or 14th time in all competitions this season. Um, another one-nothing defeat at Mighty Galatasaray in the Champions League. Still a chance to rescue the tie next week. So not all is lost, right?

SPEAKER_02 0:51

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 0:52

But uh yet another kind of poo-poo performance from our favorite team. Um, and that's led Johnny to make an alcoholic beverage that looks like a 40. He looks like he opened a 40 and poured it into a glass. Look, I'm I have a more like 40 or like Pinot Grigio. I don't know what that is.

SPEAKER_01 1:13

Yeah, it's like a dry white wine. Um it is an Equal Parts cocktail. I don't remember the name, I'm gonna be honest.

SPEAKER_00 1:20

But you don't because you've had so many?

SPEAKER_01 1:22

No, no, no, no. Uh it's new. I just have never heard of it. And Equal Parts is great, but there's a particular liqueur in it that is normally when I use it, I I use like a quarter of an ounce, like a tiny bit, and it called for much more, and that's all I can taste. So it's really unfortunate. But you know, too bad. You win some, you lose some, just like Liverpool. Am I right? You win some and you lose more than some. More than some. Too many to count, really.

SPEAKER_00 1:49

Yeah, yeah. Um, so before we kind of get into the meat of the conversation, we can catch everybody up quickly because it has been a few weeks since we have podcasted on some recent results. So, you know, as with the season writ large, some good, some bad. Right. Good. Liverpool are in the FA Cup quarterfinal.

SPEAKER_01 2:10

Let's go.

SPEAKER_00 2:11

Okay. Bad. They have to play away at City in the next round.

SPEAKER_01 2:17

Did you see the controversy around the drawing?

SPEAKER_00 2:21

And by controversy, do you mean your text to me that this is rigged in like how did Arsenal get and Chelsea get better draws than us?

SPEAKER_01 2:29

I mean, obviously that. Obviously that. But uh, I'm blanking on it. It's an English keeper. He was pulling the, you know, the the uh powerball or whatever out of the thing. But apparently you're not supposed to look inside, and they show him like bearing down in and then reaching out to be placed.

SPEAKER_00 2:46

It's not a blind draw, you're saying. He's just picking names.

SPEAKER_01 2:49

Yeah, I forget who it was. But people are like, it was Liverpool's draw or or City's draw. And it was like, let's see. And he like looked and like reached in there and was like, oh no, Liverpool.

SPEAKER_00 3:00

Do you think was it was it later on? Like, were they like, oh my god, these are ratings, disasters. We gotta pick, we gotta pick somebody good.

SPEAKER_01 3:08

We need a winner. Uh yeah, I don't know that. I don't know that. But yeah, again, I'm I'm sure you can look down. It's it's probably fairly impossible to rig that, but I thought it was funny.

SPEAKER_00 3:18

Yeah, so so anyway, not a you know, great draw there. So I would say our um path to a FA Cup final is murky, you know? Okay, you know, cloudy with a chance of rain.

SPEAKER_01 3:33

Go port Vale, am I right?

SPEAKER_00 3:35

Yeah. Godspeed. The whole nation's with you.

SPEAKER_01 3:40

That's right. They're I believe dead last in League One. So, you know. Feels good.

SPEAKER_00 3:47

End of the day, though, all you really gotta do against Arsenal is A defend corner kicks, right? And B, expect the ball to be out of play for approximately a half an hour of the game and just know going in and be okay with it.

SPEAKER_01 4:04

Right. I feel like some of the other tactics that teams should start to employ is just to really like just scream at Arteta the entire time, really get him off his game, you know, in the technical area. Just like, I don't know, like shoot rubber bands at his head or you know, make fun of his helmet hair.

SPEAKER_00 4:20

See, this is this is the kind of content that people demand.

SPEAKER_01 4:24

That's I mean, look, it's uh we had uh Atletico, and remember one of those fans got uh what's his name so worked up he spit on him.

SPEAKER_00 4:33

So you know what though I've always wondered Simeoni. So when we went to Liverpool, we went to a comedy club, and we were pretty sure that they had some people planted at the front just to kind of banter back and forth with the lead guy, right? Correct, from Wales. Like, yeah, like he's there, they're there on purpose, they kind of go back and forth, keeps him loose. He can always go to them for a funny moment. Do you ever think that a team puts a little fan plant near the opposition bench? That could be strategically interesting.

SPEAKER_01 5:07

Oh, for sure. Well, I told you when we went on the tour there with my kids, Mario, our tour guide, I see him at home games on TV every other week. Like legit. Every time the TV is like he's just like screaming in slow motion, spits flying out of his mouth. So I think you're right in the sense that there's some deals there for folks, either to aggravate, you know, the the away bench, etc.

SPEAKER_00 5:35

So yeah, and then and not nothing nefarious, but it's almost like if you know that a certain hot-tempered managers come into infield, you're like, hey, let me toss this guy some tickets, you know, let's see what happens. Right.

SPEAKER_01 5:45

100%. You know, it's no different than in American baseball. You're just like, you know, you're getting getting the infield real soaking wet. Exactly. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 5:53

You know, that's that's all part. So anyway, we digress. Yeah. Um, if we go to the Champions League, good. We're playing a in theory winnable opponent in Galatas are eight. We're also having the second leg next week at home. That's right. Bad. We lost again to them, didn't score. Backs are against the wall.

SPEAKER_01 6:15

Well, nothing again.

SPEAKER_00 6:17

Also bad. Um, this is an inspiring confidence in me that we can run what is kind of a gauntlet if we were to get through this. Because I think our path would be either PSG or Chelsea next.

SPEAKER_02 6:34

Right.

SPEAKER_00 6:34

Either City or Madrid next. Is that right?

SPEAKER_01 6:40

Uh yeah, I believe so, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:42

And then in the final, let's just okay, let's you know, let's be really unrealistic. And then in the final, we would probably run into Barcelona or Arsenal. That's uh Johnny's verifying if I just made up stuff or if that's actually true.

SPEAKER_01 7:01

Yeah, I'm looking at it.

SPEAKER_00 7:02

While he looks it up, I will just say that our chances to make it to the final look pretty slim.

SPEAKER_01 7:09

Alright, so yes. So uh we play the winner of Paris at PSG Chelsea, and then either Real Madrid or Man City will move on. And then it's almost a lock that Bayern will move on because they won 6-1 today.

SPEAKER_00 7:26

So there you go. That's my I nailed it, crushed it. So, but I'm just saying we're not gonna run that gauntlet is the point. Okay, so that's looking murky. Okay. You know what? Look, maybe you can be more optimistic than me. All right, I can't talk. I'm drinking water right now. Um then we're sixth in the Premier League. So, you know, good, bad, but I think that overall our chances of really achieving anything except for Champions League football for next season are pretty slim.

SPEAKER_01 7:56

Good though that Galatas Re has uh their fans banned from the home.

SPEAKER_00 8:04

Also good that Victor Oshman feels the need to continue to protect his nose.

SPEAKER_01 8:10

Yeah, his nose isn't broken. It's been years, guys. It's been years.

SPEAKER_00 8:14

Yeah. Um so all that to say, we're not gonna take the podcast in the typical direction that we would talk about a game or talk about you know the Premier League season. We've done that a bunch, and so a lot of other people are doing the game recaps. So, what we thought we would do is have a broader discussion on how does this get fixed for next season? Because, Johnny, I tweeted this out today, and I'll say it again. I'm not interested anymore in this whole Barney slot debate. Is he the right manager? Is it the players? Whose fault is it? At the end of the day, it doesn't really matter. We have played 44 times this season. We have lost 14 times. Basically, the point of that stat is if you draw that out and we continue to do that, he's gonna lose his job. That's the way that this works. If we continue to be mediocre, players are going to get moved and sold. Like that's the way this works. Okay. So I'm not interested in having that conversation anymore. It's kind of become a little toxic, I feel like, in certain pockets of you know social media, right? What I would rather talk about is the hierarchy that we have in place. And are they capable of fixing what is broken this season? In particular, one Michael Edwards. And the Golden Boy. The Golden Boy. And this is something that hasn't been talked about a ton, you know. But I mean, look, here's a guy who rightfully so gets a ton of credit for his role in building the Liverpool squad under Klopp that achieves so much. And I'm gonna go through the list of his signings here in a minute, but he he gets a ton of credit, and I think we were all happy, would you agree, when he decided to come back a couple of seasons ago after Klopp said he was retiring.

SPEAKER_01 10:13

Yeah, thrilled.

SPEAKER_00 10:14

Yeah. But um, and and with the caveat that it's still early in this new regime, so to speak, I would say the results have been underwhelming compared to what we saw in act one of Edwards' time here. And so I want to talk that through because you know, there's a lot of people out there. There's a little bit of a cult of Michael Edwards, in my opinion. There's a lot of people out there that would argue that maybe he was more important than Klopp, which I think is hogwash, okay, personally. Um, but I want to get into that. All right. So here's the crux of the argument, and then I'm I'm curious about how you think about it. Okay. What Michael Edwards was renowned for when he was here the first time, in my opinion, was finding all of these really, really good value signings. We were not breaking the bank. We did it a few times for sure, but we were not regularly breaking the bank and going for the most established, most expensive stars. Okay. Here's the list of people here, and we can kind of go through this, and you tell me. I mean, the ones that are really expensive are obvious, but Mo Sala cost like 40 million or less when he came over from Roma. Sadio Mane from Southampton at the time. Firmino came in, and this is before Klopp, but Edwards was a part of the committee that brought him in when he was, you know, when Brendan Rogers was still here. Andy Robertson. Hull's Winaldum. What do they both have in common? They were both, I think, relegated teams that we signed both of those players from. Newcastle was going down at the time, and I think Holt was going down at the time.

SPEAKER_01 12:04

Newcastle, PSV.

SPEAKER_00 12:06

Okay. Um Fabinho. Diogo Jota. Um, some that maybe were pseudo-whiffs. You know, Nabi Cato was probably the biggest one on that list. Axla Chamberlain, I thought I think would have been a good signing if he didn't get he had so many injury issues.

SPEAKER_01 12:25

Yeah, same with Cato. I think both of them just hammered by injuries.

SPEAKER_00 12:29

Joel Mattip was a free transfer.

SPEAKER_01 12:32

He's unreal. Right? Unreal. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:34

And then some guys who didn't stick around, like Emory Chan was a good player. Now he decided to go to Juventus, you know, and I ruined his career. Yeah, it wasn't what not what I would have done, but I think he was a good signing. Harvey Elliott. Good signing. Kanate was somebody that was signed under Edwards' regime, I'm pretty sure. And then you have the biggest ones, like Allison and Van Dyke, from a price standpoint.

SPEAKER_01 13:00

But but so before you keep go a little bit further on that, one of the interesting things though is that like you mentioned Van Dyke being expensive, Allison being expensive, and at the time they were obviously relative to now, not even close. But was there a huge I maybe I'm misremembering? There wasn't a massive competition for them, was there?

SPEAKER_00 13:21

Well, what I remember about Van Dyke in particular was that City, and then this you have to like caveat what you believe because sometimes the team will leak something that's not really true. But I've heard that City actually said no or didn't want him, and that kind of opened the door for us. Who knows if that's true? Sure. Right. But if you recall, Klopp was such a closer at bringing guys in that, like basically he had convinced Van Dyke to come and that he was sort of that missing piece in the back line to make this work. And so I don't I don't think there was a ton of competition because we talked about this over the summer. I think a lot of times the way these transfers work is there's a ton of back chatter, and you kind of know where these guys want to go, and you also kind of know if maybe they're open-minded to a couple of places, and then it becomes a true bidding war, right? But but anyway, in Van Dyke's case, I think he just wanted to come here.

SPEAKER_01 14:19

Well, the re yeah, the reason I say that too is there's almost this interesting other piece to it that it feels like I mean, maybe this is where you're going too. Nowadays, I feel like that isn't a part of the puzzle. Now it's just like it's almost pure like trophies and money, or maybe sometimes even just money. So the ways that you know we've sort of had to adapt the way that we sign players is more just let's just throw the bag at you, and that's the only way we can actually get it done. Anyway, I know you're probably going there at some point.

SPEAKER_00 14:54

Totally agree. So I think the main point I want to drive home about that list that's obvious to people who have followed the club is that again, there was a lot of great value there. You had free transfers, you had guys that were being relegated, you had guys that weren't established yet, that weren't established names yet. What's interesting to me is Edwards comes in, he hires Richard Hughes straight away from Burnmouth. Burnmouth is obviously a team that doesn't have anywhere near the financial power that Liverpool have. And so kind of have made their name on astute signings. I mean, you see a lot of very good young players that come through Burnmouth that get elevated to other bigger teams. Um, one example of many. Yep. Um our left back is one, right? So what's interesting to you know that happened this summer, though, is I feel like our approach has shifted in some ways way away from the Edwards that I remember. And then if you look at some of the transfer targets that have been rumored for this summer, it's a little bit more of the same. Okay. And so, you know, look, everybody knows this, but just remember, we signed Esok for what$125 million or something like that over the summer. Um we signed Florian Verts again for a ton of money. Um, and both of those guys, while they're in the ilk of the expensive signing that Edwards has done before, both of those guys um at once were really, really interesting signings versus trying to get some of those more like diamond in the rough people in the door. Right? Um, Kirk is one that I think could be a diamond in the rough. Okay, we'll see. He's been much better recently. And then Hugo Katique is has been largely very, very good. Very expensive, but very, very good, right?

SPEAKER_02 16:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:54

Um, definitely, I would say the best of the three that were signed, you know, uh up top between him, Yokarez, and then Sesco.

SPEAKER_01 17:04

Do you think that the fact that we signed Isak for such a high price tag is almost, I know this sounds weird, but almost has put a damper on Ekatke?

SPEAKER_00 17:15

In what way?

SPEAKER_01 17:16

Well, just just because like we've spent so much money on this other player that's playing in the same position that's been injured. It almost, I don't know, I feel like it almost has put a damper on Ekatke because we we almost need him to be better because Isak is A, either so poor or B, gonna come back from injury, that it almost has like put more pressure on him.

SPEAKER_00 17:38

More pressure, sure. Yeah, sure. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, you you're right. You could view him in a different way if he is uh super sub or if he's somebody that's not you know relied on to score you know goal contributions every single game. Right. Um but anyway, where I wanted to go with this, Johnny, is like sometimes act two doesn't live up to act one. How many sequels do we know? Movie sequels that we're just like, oh man, we gotta go see, you know, whatever two, you know, and it's just like yeah, happy gunmore two was not great. It was not great. It's bad. I'm gonna watch the sequel. If the first movie was that good, I'm gonna watch the sequel no matter what. But how often are you like, whoa, that met my expectations?

SPEAKER_01 18:24

Almost never. Almost never almost never.

SPEAKER_00 18:27

And so I'm not saying that's the case with Michael Edwards, but what I am saying is that so far I'm not seeing the level of scouting, the level of kind of ahead of the curve that we saw the first time. And am I being too critical? Am I just caught in this bad season and now I'm just deciding to now just take out my anger on Michael Edwards, or what do you think?

SPEAKER_01 18:54

Well, I think it's a couple things. One, this is a bit of a mixed bag in the sense of as much as there was this rivalry or at least contentious relationship speculated between Edwards and Klopp, I feel like they were they worked really well together in that Edwards could find a diamond in the rough and then Klopp could convince him into the project. Whether they were like, you know, a low-tier guy or a high-tier guy. Uh clearly uh slot has been able to as well, even with like Florent Verts being an example. But I wonder, uh let me let me kick this back to you. Here's a couple thoughts I have. One is do you think the fact that Edwards' job is different has caused him to get a little lazy and take his eye off the prize? One, two, and you said this, and I I didn't ping in my brain until just now. The fact that um Hughes is here and he has an organization that is in a different strata financially speaking, has that caused his eye to change in the way that he deals with players where he had to be sort of a bargain hunter at Burnmouth, and now he's like, Oh, I got the, you know, not necessarily the bag that we expected in the you know this past summer, but he's got resources that he never could have dreamed of here versus there. And so even the way that he's approached signings has changed. Do you think those are in play?

SPEAKER_00 20:20

So so let's address both those questions. So, number one, to be fair to Edwards, his job is different now. Okay. But I mean, like, as with anybody who has a job who has people that report to them, you're still responsible for those people. And he still needs to give Hughes some sort of guidance on here is what I want from the transfer policy. Okay. And so look, he's in the loop all summer when it's like, hey, what do we think about ASOC? What do we think about ESOC? And he, of course, was like, yeah, you know, if the money works, great, whatever. And sanction that deal. It might have been Hughes's brainchild, it might have been Arnie Slot's brainchild, but ultimately he allowed it, right? And so what doesn't seem to have rung true last summer was any sort of guidance on, like, look, I think we need to go with um some more value quantity over quality. It seemed like everybody was aligned with sort of this star approach. Is that fair?

SPEAKER_01 21:21

Yeah. Oh, yeah, for sure. But I I it was this weird that's that's the question I ask myself some sometimes is there's this weird convergence of, yeah, we need to get the stars, but I wonder if those stars happen to at this moment in time align with the data that he's always looking at, too. True. That's like the weird part. But yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:40

And then the second question I think is super, super interesting because listen, we've all been here, right? Like, think about what they think about your alcohol purchases. Think about when you go shopping. When you were just out of college and you were broke, right? You were looking at a certain shopping. Shelf to get your alcoholic beverages, your beer labels are a little different than they maybe they are today.

SPEAKER_02 22:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:07

When you went to, you know, buy some uh some more clothes, like maybe you're buying some way more expensive shoes than you were doing 15 years ago. But the reality is, I think the question is, do you are those that much better than just buying two pairs of the shoes you used to get? You know?

SPEAKER_01 22:24

It's the quality over the quantity. Yeah, yep.

SPEAKER_00 22:27

And so maybe that's a little bit different for Hughes too. I don't know. You know? But the reason why I wanted to have the conversation is that it's obvious to me, regardless of what we do with Arnie Slot, that we still have a lot of work to do on the roster. Do you agree? And if you agree with that, then the targets that I'm seeing over the summer are a little concerning because it's the same thing. It's like we want to go get Barcala, or we want to go get umisee, it's gonna cost$125 million. And I'm like, wait a minute, what's going on here? Are we just like are we even doing any work? Like anybody could come up with those names. You and I could go be the transfer team over at Liverpool and we would come up with those names, right?

SPEAKER_01 23:11

No problem. Well, it's like the joke we used to say where like anytime you read transfer lists, you're like, blah, blah, blah, wants this guy, also Chelsea. And it was like they're just copying everyone's homework. Um there's also a yeah, well, all that to say, I think we're getting very lazy. I think it's it's pretty simplistic for us to just look and say, who's the most high profile, you know, expensive player in that position? Let's go get him. That's pretty easy. We could do that. Lots of people could do that. I don't think those are bad players. I don't think that they're available necessarily. I don't know that we want to actually invest in those guys. And then, as we've seen, sometimes you can do that. And on paper, it looks great, but then the actual output on the field looks not so great.

SPEAKER_00 23:53

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 23:54

Yeah, sure. Sure. The other thing I wonder with Edwards is this. Do you think he saw or his data showed some of the it feels like the drop-offs of some of the players that we had? It just feels like, you know, we we you know, in the offseason, I'll be the first to say I was like, man, we are going to run the league. This is insane. Same year.

SPEAKER_00 24:21

We we both are like we crushed it. We did.

SPEAKER_01 24:24

And then as soon as the season started, you know, like five, six, seven games in, I was like, oh well, we're kind of thin. And it was before all the injuries happened. And then I started to realize, you know, oh, so and so, you know, like Sal has dropped off, uh, Mac has dropped off, uh, Grav has dropped off, uh, Kanate has dropped uh. So do we miss that too? I think it's one of these two things where do we get who we needed to get, and then we do we also miss the fact that we needed to replace guys or bring depth in with other guys as well.

SPEAKER_00 24:56

Yes, it's a great point. Because think about again, let's go back to Edwards 1.0, right? He refused to give genuine Aldem a contract extension. And what we've read is that part of when it started to fall apart with him and Klopp is when Klopp wanted to give Hendo one.

SPEAKER_01 25:14

Right.

SPEAKER_00 25:15

He would never, if it was up to him, at least prior to you know, V2, like he never would have given Van Dyke and Salah contract extensions. These are guys in their mid-30s. That was like a no-no for him. And we had how many podcasts did we do last year where we're like, well, look, if it's up to Edwards, these guys are not gonna get re signed. It's just not happening. Right. And then they both did. Yeah. And and and again, hand up, we advocated for them to. Like, I'm I'm not, you know, I'm not trying to play both sides, but I think your question is did we did the data team, did the statistical team, did they get this wrong? Where like these guys have both declined and like whatever, and what happened? Again, it's a fair question. It's a fair question. The overall question, again, though, I think, guys, you know, if we're kind of rambling here, is just like, are we getting the level of excellence that we got the first time? Because so many things went right with with Edwards, and maybe a part of this is Klopp too. I mean, maybe it's just it really was this really great relationship where he was so good at getting the maximum amount of guys he brought in, right?

SPEAKER_02 26:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:27

Um, but I think it's a key thing to to ask ourselves like if you think about again this summer, you know, we brought in um the center back who who may be the long-term Van Dyke replacement, you know, the who who's already injured, awesome. For six months, great, yeah, great. Um, we signed Leone. You know, so I think our center backs, you know, while injured, the future looks bright when they're actually gonna be healthy, you know? Yes, when they're when their injuries heal, it's gonna be great.

SPEAKER_01 26:57

Um when our right back gets better, which one? I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 27:00

Yeah. But there's still a lot of surgery to do on the team. There's there's like like we're gonna have to replace Salah, obviously. I think we would both say we're going to have to upgrade on Gakpo, obviously.

SPEAKER_01 27:14

We need a left and right winger, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 27:15

Yep. We absolutely need to figure out the right back spot because we can't depend on Bradley. So, so you know, we've been over all this. Like, what do we do with the midfield? We just apparently we we we just re-signed Gravenberg before Dom. I don't understand that at all, but whatever. But what do we do with the midfield? Do we do we move Mac on? Does does Curtis Jones you know, because now slot hates him, does he leave? Yeah, we don't know.

SPEAKER_01 27:40

Well, no, I mean there's well, and this is the part too where it's interesting you made the point that you know, did Klopp have a lot to do with this? Because I think we're where and you and I have talked about this before with Edwards, the approach where to me data falls apart a little bit. Obviously, it's a good metric on uh a lot of different details, but you can't you can take that and then bring it into the context of an actual team in a starting 11, and you can't guarantee how that will go. And so I think the thing that made Klopp, and I I I actually feel for slot in this a little bit because I think he's gotten a mixed bag of what he wanted and what he didn't actually want. But I think that what made Klopp unreal is he probably got that more oftentimes than not, like what he wanted and what he didn't want, uh like a mixed bag, and was able to make an unreal product on the field as a result of that, bringing people to the highest level, versus we seem like we're playing with a gap on the field in some way, shape, or form almost every time we step out on the on the pitch. And you know, whether it's you know, we we didn't want Diaz to go, you know, left winger missing, didn't want Mo or Mo's a problem, right winger, you know. The list goes on. You you you've covered that. But um, I think that's the part that that is also hard to gauge of just where you can have all these great talents data-wise, but how they actually build into a a gelled starting 11 that that plays well together with a coach that kind of knows how they want to actually employ them is hard to come by.

SPEAKER_00 29:21

Yeah, absolutely fair. So um, you know, I'll leave it at this. What we need to feel okay about sort of a bogey season is just hope going into next season. Do we feel like we have the right manager? I think that's an open question. Do we feel like we have the right recruitment staff? That's the question I'm asking now. Because think about it, you know, if we say no to both of those, and I'm not saying we are, but if we said no to both of those, that's like kind of a bleak place to be in. You know, I don't think Liverpool want to be in a place where we're perpetually fighting for the Europa League, right? So um, so you know, I think it'll be very interesting to see how Hughes and Edwards kind of prove their worth this summer. I mean, I think there's there's definite pressure on everybody after what happened and what's happening this season, barring us making this magical run and like winning a trophy, you know. And and by the way, I don't think the like if we win the FA Cup, that doesn't there's that's not a get out of jail free card. The Champions League is the only one. Sure. I'll tell I'll I will retract, I will have multiple podcast retractions if we win the Champions League, but if we win the FA Cup, I'm not gonna be like, oh yeah, never mind. Sixth season.

SPEAKER_01 30:46

Oh wait, hold on. Okay, so if we win FA Cup and we go like if is there a sequence where like we have to finish in a certain level on both the others in order for us for it to be successful? Is it top four? So you're like, if we get third, FA Cup, and then like let's say we go semis in Champions League. Okay, and that which is not gonna happen, um, and then we get top four.

SPEAKER_00 31:15

Okay, okay. Or is it just top four? No, no, you're you're not wrong. I think for me to take back that statement, okay, we have to win the FA Cup. Okay, we have to finish third. And we have to I w no, third. Do you see how bad listen? Finishing third means that we overtook the dead carcass Sebastian Villa, who have just completely fallen apart.

unknown 31:44

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 31:46

We finish above a Manchester United team who has an interim manager right now. I have to say those are both non-negotiables. You have to do that. And I'll actually say this like if we just get past PSG, if we get to the quarters, I'll be happy. If those if those things happened, I would say, okay, I take it back. This is a little better than I thought it would be.

SPEAKER_01 32:17

I will say as well, it seems as though and I not that this matters, but it seems as though England is in the driver's seat to get a fifth spot for CL.

SPEAKER_00 32:27

Yeah. I mean, I mean it would be but that's the thing. It would be equally embarrassing if we if we can't qualify again, like see, that would mean that we can't overtake Villa. Everybody's beating Villa right now.

SPEAKER_01 32:45

Listen, yeah, I I'm here yet, but we just lost the wolves. We did just lose the wolves, yeah. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 32:50

Um now let me give let me give because I you know, I think that a lot of the hierarchy listens to this podcast, as we know, right? That's true.

SPEAKER_01 33:00

Rut real quick, why do we re-sign Grav? He's Dutch. That's why. Yeah, sorry.

SPEAKER_00 33:05

Okay. You're right, man. See again, buddy sick insight. That's right. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 33:11

You heard it here first.

SPEAKER_00 33:12

Here's here's a recommendation.

SPEAKER_01 33:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 33:15

So I'm kind of honing in on this Winalden relegation team signing, right? Andy Robertson relegation team signing. There's two there's two teams that have some talent that are maybe going down.

SPEAKER_02 33:31

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 33:32

Three even. Three. West Ham has some talent. You know, we've been linked with Bowen for about half a decade now.

SPEAKER_02 33:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:40

No replacement. Come on.

SPEAKER_02 33:42

That's right. No.

SPEAKER_00 33:44

Nottingham Forest. There's a very real, very funny chance they go down.

SPEAKER_01 33:49

Oh. But everybody wants their that their midfielder, what's whatever his name is.

SPEAKER_00 33:53

Oh, at Morgan Gibbs White?

SPEAKER_01 33:55

No, no, no, no, no. The one that scored the goal. Hold on.

SPEAKER_00 33:58

But I'm saying, listen, and then and then Spurs, who are like abject. I mean, did you see they had to sub their keeper out of the game today? Oh no. Because he gave they gave up three goals in the first 15 minutes, and two of them were his fault. Like one of them was just a horrible giveaway, and they literally yanked him.

SPEAKER_01 34:18

Oh, who yanked the keeper?

SPEAKER_00 34:20

Yeah. So my point is there's a couple of teams there that you could pick some decent players off of. So listen, just throwing that out there for uh, you know, for consideration. So, Michael, if if you're really kind of phoning it in, you know, like there's there's some easy solves here if those two teams go down.

SPEAKER_01 34:39

Listen, what he's trying to say, if I can translate, is Michael Edwards, get Richarlison as soon as possible. Do not.

SPEAKER_00 34:49

I might I might be out if we do that. Yeah, no. Yeah. Okay. Um, okay. So listen, that was that was kind of it for topics I wanted to discuss today. I mean, anything that uh you wanted to talk through?

SPEAKER_01 35:03

Uh, I mean, we already covered Oshman and his fake broken nose. We did. Let me ask you this, because this was a topic in the game. Just like a quick quick hit. It seems as though there is a rule where defensive players, if there's a handball in the box, we or or I guess in general, we gotta we have to stipulate, well, you know, was it on purpose, was it not, sort of, or was it in a natural position, or those sorts of things. But now we've had two handballs called against Liverpool. Ironically, in scoring goals, where neither of them, in my opinion, a little biased, but but I think the Mac one for sure, neither of them in any way was was used in order to score the goal.

SPEAKER_00 35:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:51

So it seems like we have these weird standards that are almost appearing now. And this is why I pseudo-hate VAR and pseudo-hate replay, because like the minute details of things, but like what are we doing?

SPEAKER_00 36:03

Yeah, it feels like the handball rule is now this. The ball can in no way go off your hand and go in the goal. It doesn't matter, like, doesn't matter. I don't care how it happens. We were kind of joking around off air. If if like I'm the defender, you're the attacker, there's a corner kick, I might just grab your arm and just have you smack the ball. That might be my move. But I mean, like, literally, if and and that's what was so weird about today because it was such bad luck. Like, the ball's kind of like you know, pinballing around, and you know, Kanate's doing what he normally does, like he's like you know, wrestling somebody in the box, and that guy's wrestling back, and the ball kind of hits him and goes in. And and to me, this is kind of that we lose the whole spirit of the rule conversation. Yes. It's like, yeah, look, he didn't maradonna it. I mean, if he did, sure. We don't count that. 100%, right? But I mean, like, that's not what happened. So I don't know, you know, like I I think you call it a goal. And and and hand up, if that happened against us, I'd be like, uh, that sucks. I'd probably call it a goal. I'm not trying to be a hypocrite.

SPEAKER_01 37:18

Yeah, on some level, if you watch that uh uh, you know, opposing view, if you're defending that, you're like, guys, like what are we doing? Like, clear the ball.

SPEAKER_00 37:26

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:27

It's not like, oh well, they cheated. Yeah. The Mac one was even worse. He wasn't even facing the goal.

SPEAKER_00 37:32

Wasn't even, I know. So no, it's a good question. Um, I mean, we're just we're just kind of like here's another one.

SPEAKER_01 37:39

Ooh.

SPEAKER_00 37:40

The Wrexham Chelsea game. Red card. Not the red card. Although that, although, although we could talk about that too, but did you see the uh the equalizer potential one at 3-3 that they got called off for offsides? You know, someone made a great point on social media. They were like, the offsides rule was never created for corner kicks. Like, think about it. The whole point of offsides is gaining an advantage on like cherry picking or running behind uh, you know, a back line and having an extra five yards um before I start running. You know what I mean? And so, like, that's that's the point, right? You don't get a head start. That's the point. It's not intended for a corner kick. I mean, like, who cares? And so we've just completely lost why these rules exist.

SPEAKER_01 38:30

Yep. Yep. I think it's similar to the the the shout we've had about uh penalty kicks and and you know, if you're in the corner of the box, not facing your goal, you get fouled, you're like free shot on goal. I think some some of it is while I agree with all of these things, I'm not entirely sure how to adjudicate you know things going forward. I don't I have you seen the um Arson Wanger uh offside. That one feels weird to me too.

SPEAKER_00 39:02

Yeah. So I like that he's trying and he's thinking outside the box. He's getting hammered for it, and people are like, did I can't believe he coached. Does he even know football? Okay. But at least he's trying something.

unknown 39:17

Right.

SPEAKER_00 39:18

Because there's the like Johnny's toenail was offsides thing that we're doing now.

SPEAKER_01 39:22

Well, there was literally I I forget which which match it was, but they showed they showed the you know the lines drawn for VAR, and it was the guy's face. Like, what are we doing? His face. It was like like a skim of like his nose and something else that was offsides. And I was just like, guys, I I can't.

SPEAKER_00 39:40

See, this is this is this is like we're turning this part of the pot into like referee corner, which I'm all for it. I like it. Um, let me ask you this. Ooh, would the game be better or worse? Stay on the on-sides topic or offside side. Okay, if you could only be offsides in the penalty area, okay? So so now you're not doing high lines anymore, you can't, because if you do a high line and I'm in between the penalty area and like you know, you so you can't do it. And I wonder though, with more space, because if you you've watched these games, like so I go to crew games all the time. I've told you this. When you're at a game, it is so much more um blatant how much teams are compressing the space with these high lines. Anyway, I'm just curious. Like, if you didn't made that rule, what would happen? You'd have a you'd have a ton more space to play in. Yeah, you would.

SPEAKER_01 40:43

You hate it.

SPEAKER_00 40:44

You hate it.

SPEAKER_01 40:45

Well, but I wonder, yeah, I mean, it sort of takes away from the whole point of offsides in the first place. I wonder if it's funny because we both coach and kids where they have like the zones where you can't be offsides. Uh so it's sort you're sort of like describing a version of that kind of. I wonder at the end of the day, I think the other thing you're competing against with soccer is like people want to see goals. And so this is sort of where we're going. Um, and I feel like that would err against seeing more goals scored, ironically, maybe.

SPEAKER_00 41:18

I think you would see more because here's the thing so how often now are you just seeing, oh, Darwin Nunez was offsides. Oh man. Oh, it's a goal! Oh, yeah, he's offsides, you know. Right. That's true. By the way, um Arson just texted me. He wants me to be a part of his thing tank on offsides, so he he likes the idea.

SPEAKER_01 41:37

Darwin just texted me and said, Do you have any jobs for me? So he's he's looking for work. Turns out. All right, B. Yeah, I mean it it's interesting. I I think that's the the tough thing that leagues are straddling is trying to figure out how do we figure out this rule and also not, you know, the the hack against soccer is like, oh, so so boring, it's one-nothing. That's the worst.

SPEAKER_00 42:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 42:05

I did hear a comedian say this though. So, you know, and like American football fans are like, hey, soccer's so boring, it's like, you know, two to one. And I was like, well, we could just multiply that times numbers to, you know, because that's what American football does, is like 14-7 is just two to one. Right. Just for the record, just two to one.

SPEAKER_00 42:26

So yeah, it's like watching a um every Steelers game, just saying.

SPEAKER_01 42:31

Just two to one. So whatever. It's fine.

SPEAKER_00 42:33

Um, last question we'll wrap. You saw that the Liverpool are coming to the US this summer.

SPEAKER_01 42:38

I did see that.

SPEAKER_00 42:40

Are we going? And if if so, where are we going?

SPEAKER_01 42:43

Uh, I saw, let's see. Uh I saw Chicago, I saw New York, I'm missing Nashville. Nashville, I mean who is playing where?

SPEAKER_00 42:54

So we are playing Wrexham, I believe at Yankee Stadium.

SPEAKER_01 42:58

Gross. Okay, good.

SPEAKER_00 43:00

We're playing Leeds at in Chicago. I'm imagining it's at Soldier Field, but I'm not sure. Not I'm not positive on the venue, but I would imagine so just given the um now. The Nashville game, I want to say Sunderland, but I don't remember.

SPEAKER_01 43:19

I think you're right. I think you're right.

SPEAKER_00 43:21

Listen, it's like a steel trap. You know, you know, you had to look up that whole Champions League thing, but I was correct.

SPEAKER_01 43:26

So here's my here's my thought. Well, one, I have to check the old diary, as the people in the UK say. Uh, but I I kind of am grossed out. I actually do deep down in my heart root for Wrexham, if I'm honest. Uh it's quite a story. But if you go to New York where they're owned by Hollywood, you know.

SPEAKER_00 43:50

Yeah, nobody be offended. Nobody be offended. I don't want to go to that game. Well, I've got to do it. I also don't I I'm not a fan of watching I'm not a fan of watching soccer and baseball stadiums anyway. It's such a Janky, so like no, no.

SPEAKER_01 44:02

Right. Uh I do love New York though, so I would I would like that. But uh Shy Town, like I'm a diehard Cubs fan, so that's great.

SPEAKER_00 44:11

See, that's the thing. You pair it with a Cubs game. Saturday night because the game is Sunday night.

SPEAKER_01 44:18

Ooh, no, when are they in Chicago?

SPEAKER_00 44:21

August 2nd.

unknown 44:23

All right.

SPEAKER_00 44:24

That's the one I'm leaning towards. Yeah, it's closer for me anyway, but that's what I'm leaning towards. How far is Nashville from you? I thought that's not that. It's actually the same. I mean, like, but the problem is, like, you and I are having our beach trip that week. I don't think I can go.

SPEAKER_01 44:36

Oh gosh, the beach trip. I know. I know. Let's just ditch that jam. Craps. Hey, wives, go hang out with our parents. All right. See ya. No, let's not do that.

SPEAKER_00 44:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:48

Here's the thing. They listen to the pod, so they're going to hear that. It's awkward. So love you guys. Love you. Mina. Just kidding. That's right. We do. We do. All right. That yeah, that could that could be a thing. That could be a thing.

SPEAKER_00 45:01

If anybody out there wants to meet up there too, let us know. We I think Chicago's what I want to put in pencil. Okay. Let's let's marinate on that one.

SPEAKER_01 45:11

I'll and I'll I'll text Jurgen when we get off here, see what he's up to. Seems like he's done with Red Bull. Did you hear that?

SPEAKER_00 45:17

It's because he's coming back. No, just kidding.

SPEAKER_01 45:20

Yeah, we love round twos, as we said.

SPEAKER_00 45:22

Yeah, that I don't think that would go well either, honestly.

SPEAKER_01 45:24

Well, yeah, he'd come back and then Edwards would be like, I quit. Can't do this.

SPEAKER_00 45:29

Then you'd know for sure, actually. That'd be so funny. You'd know for sure if he just turned it as two weeks' notice. Although out there, that's the other thing that's funny, is it's not a two-week notice there. It's like, you know what I'm saying? Like, not all the time. Sometimes it's like it's like so-and-so's left with immediate effect. But sometimes it's like, um, yeah, he's gonna see out the rest of the season, and then he's serving out his leave period or his notice period. And I'm like, here it's like you get fired or you give two weeks' notice.

SPEAKER_01 45:59

No, I I have noticed in in the UK, there's some really generous kind of terms. Yeah. Fraternity is pretty nice. We don't have that here because we work always in America.

SPEAKER_00 46:11

I'm I'm gonna go work after I'm done with this. Just kidding.

SPEAKER_01 46:13

Yeah. Caretaker, what what's that? When they say they're you're it they're just like you're the or you're the uh oh no, uh gosh, I'm gonna butcher the name of this. Where you're like the garden uh gardening leave, that one.

SPEAKER_00 46:26

Yes, yes. What is that? That's it. I don't know what that is, but I mean, I want some gardening leave.

SPEAKER_01 46:31

It sounds like I think I think it the the gist of it is when uh you're like sort of taking over for somebody, but like there's nothing for you to do.

SPEAKER_00 46:40

You're sort of just like yeah, you know, you're like I think sometimes there's like maybe like a conflict event just where you can't start right away, so you're on gardening leave. I don't know. Oh yeah. See somebody tell us reach out and tell us what does that mean?

SPEAKER_01 46:52

But anyway, we're Americans. We don't know. We don't know, we don't have that. All right, uh yards, not gardens, yards.

SPEAKER_00 47:00

Final call. Are we gonna win this tie?

SPEAKER_01 47:04

Yes, I believe we will. It'll be yucky.

SPEAKER_00 47:07

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 47:08

I'm gonna say like three-one.

SPEAKER_00 47:10

So they're so we're gonna blank them three-nothing. No, no, no. No, no, no. I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_01 47:14

We're gonna the next game will be three-one. Ah, okay. Agreed, agreed.

SPEAKER_00 47:18

We don't we don't do clean sheets, Johnny. Um so yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:22

Also I Allison's hurt, pray for his hamstrings, and then first thing we do is like, hey, Marmadashville, what if we gave up an early goal? Great. Of course we were gonna do that. Yeah, he had some good saves that he's actually.

SPEAKER_00 47:36

He had a really good one first half, kept it from being 2-0 off a header.

SPEAKER_01 47:39

Right side, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:40

It was good good marking on the header, too.

SPEAKER_01 47:42

I thought that was good, yeah. So like leave him. And the goal was great marking too.

SPEAKER_00 47:46

Let's leave both really good, really good on it from the start, you know. So all right. Well, hey, good stuff as usual, Johnny. You brought it tonight. You brought it. Um, so yeah, we'll be back here probably in the next couple of weeks, and we can follow up on our progress in the second uh leg of the champions league and see if we're moving through. And then you know what? Maybe it's so tight. Maybe we're more optimistic. Maybe next time we're sitting in fourth. Never know in the Premier League. So we'll see. Okay. That's true. But for Johnny, I'm Matt. You've been listening to America's Anfield. We will catch you next time.

SPEAKER_01 48:26

Thanks for tuning in to America's Anfield. If you enjoyed the show, make sure to like, subscribe, and follow us on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcast. You can also find us on YouTube, Twitter, Threads, and Instagram at America's Anfield. Got questions or topics you want us to cover? Send them our way. We'd love to include them in a future episode. Until next time, up the reds.