beejay

http://icliverpool.icnetwork.co.uk/liverpo...-name_page.html Pleased with most of that. Carson as back-up to Reina is a huge improvement on last year and Guthrie is a decent prospect IMO. Also Torres wants to come - if true this could be the deciding factor

I know, beggars belief. The Mail was suggesting that Rafa bid for Torres without G&H permission as some sort of a "show me your money" publicity stunt! I fully expect us to buy Benayoun, Torres (probably with Luis in part-ex) & Mancini in the next week or so blowing out of the water all this stuff about our ambition. That will be the best part of £40m with Bellamy, Cisse & Gonzalez to recoup c £20m. Should leave enough for Owen in January when he has proved his fitness.

Quick media round-up : WHU to accept increased £4.5m offer for Benayoun, possible part-ex with Bellamy Villa want Scott Carson for £3.5m Torres deal stalled because Athletico won't drop the £27m release price Talksport exclusive Rafa has been givem max £15m budget from G&H plus what he can raise in sales Sigh..

RVN is 30!! Torres is 23 and the Spanish national No 9. Mancs spent £30m on Ferdinand, £26m on Rooney Chelsea £24m Drogba (when he was far from a big name in France) Essien £24m Shevchenko £29m Eto'o would cost £35-40m Villa £30m + Bent £17m FFS It's the market.

Hell of an over-reaction. The 1st sentence could be a mission statement for ynwa.tv!!

Parry will get 20,000 applications, 1,500 seats will go to the corporates and the rest will be balloted with a 1 in f*ck all chance

Don't agree with that. He looks like a kid with his spiky hair and does go to ground fairly easily (they all do in la liga) but he is tough enough and can dish it out as well.

If Torres hits the ground running this is the type of player who would take us to a new level. Interesting that both he & Benayoun are ball-carriers - how often has it been said that we lack these skills? With Kewell back we may have them in abundance. Genuinely thrilled at this news, just hope it comes off although will be sad to see anyone taking our Luis away

Torres was my No 1 "please let it be true" - all the match-going lads in our pub drew up a list of wannabuys after Athens and my picks were Torres, Owen, Simao & Pederson based on £50m spend with £20m coming back in sales. Maybe Bent was 2nd choice and Spurs are now getting him after we agreed a deal with Athletico

The whole transfer business nowadays is a blown-up game of charade. Gone are the days when 2 Old Etonian chairmen sat down for an expensive lunch and agreed transfer deals with a shake of the hands. The influx of foreign players (with foreign chairmen and a different set of business rules), agents & the transfer window means that everyone plays a game of bluff & counter-bluff and it becomes a saga to see who will be the first to blink. Marseilles are trying it on now with Cisse and playing the game through leaks to their local press that will then be reported here. I've got no doubt at all that the Echo & Bascombe have been doing the same thing at the behest of Rafa. Rafa is frustrated of course but that is part of the game, he has to be clever about the signals coming out of the club or his budget will be eaten up by having to pay over-inflated prices for his top 1 or 2 targets leaving no money for nos 3 & 4.

If the player doesn't settle however or fails to adapt to the Premiership the re-sale value of a 30 year old is not a lot. Morientes for example. I'm still hoping we will get Torres rather than Milito particularly if the price is now below £20m as some reports are saying

Thankful that we now would have a strikeforce that would be diverse and scare most defences in the world. But worried that goals would not be coming from midfield to maintain a league challenge.

According to one of the senior guys on the legal team dealing with the takeover the figure was £50m but this was not binding.

Because the 2 players he was referring to don't play in Spain?

Well, I for one was posting yesterday that this would be a Rafa-style signing when most were claiming the link was silly season speculation. As someone on another forum said - Benayoun could be our Houghton, now Rafa can go & get Beardsley & Barnes.

Woah, steady with the abuse. You have your opinion, I have mine. My "slight" wasn't directed solely at you, there are plenty of others who are dismissing him as squad fodder primarily because he's cheap and not a star name.

I really think people are underestimating Benayoun. It was a regular complaint during last season about the lack of ball carriers and players who can spot a killer pass & these are precisely the attributes Benayoun would bring to our game, especially against the packed defences we come up against so often nowadays. He is a very, very good player & works hard as well. I reckon he could be an ace signing and typically Rafa, for not a lot of money because of his contract status. Just because he won't cost a king's ransom doesn't mean he's no good and "just a squad player".

Not exactly - Usher suggested that Rafa felt Torres was more potential than proven and that didn't equate to the prices previously being bandied around for him but at the right price, he wouldn't rule it out particularly if he missed out on other targets. Our targets may be diminishing - Bent gone, Eto'o & Tevez out of our range (supposedly), Villa staying in Spain. Must be Owen

Can't help but think this is a Crouch-style signing from Rafa. Most fans don't rate him as LFC class but has caught Rafa's eye through Quality performances against us notably last year's cup final. Could still be utter b******s but...

That only says he has agreed a deal not signed it so the subsequent indie report and the story from israel may be kosher (sorry!) Good player IMO he's a ballcarrier of the type we are missing, works hard and has an eye for the defence splitting pass. He & Tevez worked well together in West Ham's last few games. 4m or so would be decent business as a RM option if we don't have megabucks

This one? http://sport.independent.co.uk/football/pr...icle2621614.ece

You don't think the manager knows the price of the player he is buying?

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/foo...icle1837967.ece Interesting to revisit those quotes in the light of what's happened (or not happened) since

That's a massive leap of faith. You know feck all and I know feck all but to deduce from our collective ignorance that the entire world knows feck all on this subject is

The rest of rafa's quote at the time was that the 2 players were in the £15-20m euro bracket ergo not the Hungarian kids. To add to DH's comments about the rival takeover bids, one of the concerns to me was the idea that 2 US billionaires with no previous experience of working together could at short notice create a seamless 50 : 50 Joint Venture as the ideal vehicle for such a complex business as Liverpool FC. The archetypal self-made billionaire businessman has an ego to match his bank account and equal say in a new business means compromise which they ain't used to. It's the same in management - Houllier & Evans thrown together and told they are joint managers, recipe for disaster. If they have fallen out now - as a few rumours are suggesting - this is likely to lead to indecision and poor communication from the top down hence the frustration from Rafa.