Barcelona Sign Javier Mascherano
It took Javier Mascherano sitting out for Liverpool against Manchester City to make this finally happen but Barcelona’s plan B has finally been signed by the Spanish Champions.
I’ve made mention of this prior much to the dislike of Liverpool fans but this transfer saga was handled wrong by all parties, not just Mascherano when he decided to sit out. Everyone knew going back to last year Mascherano wanted out and quite frankly considering all that is going on with Liverpool these last couple of years if Barcelona comes calling most players are going to desire playing there. Mascherano gave it another year because Liverpool weren’t going to sell both Xabi Alonso and him. We all know from there how Liverpool’s season then turned out. Once the season ended, at the very least once Roy Hodgson was signed should Liverpool have started to sell a player who clearly didn’t want to be there anymore.
Besides this is Javier Mascherano not Torres or Gerrard we are talking about. Mascherano is a good player but it isn’t like he is a Liverpool legend. If his heart isn’t with Liverpool anymore, sell him and get it over with before it caused a distraction which it clearly did. In the end, wrong as it may be Mascherano did what he had to do. Loyality is a two way street and everyone knows football clubs aren’t exactly loyal either. If so Robbie Fowler or Sami Hyypia would still be a Red. It’s not like Mascherano grew up in Liverpool, he most likely doesn’t even like England. It’s business on both sides of the coin and both sides are guilty of bad business here but I still can’t blame Mascherano who should of been sold long ago. The last point I wanted to make is people saying Mascherano hurt his transfer value by walking out. Well, yes it gave Liverpool no cards to play with but they should of been smart enough to see something like this happening. Besides they paid close to 20 million for Mascherano which is on the high end for a defensive midfielder, unless Manchester City came calling even with Liverpool having all the power they weren’t going to turn a huge profit on the player. Getting rid of a player who didn’t want to be there plus getting most of your money back isn’t an awful return for Liverpool. It could always be worst, look at the loss Barcelona took selling Zlatan Ibrahimovic as an example.
August 31st, 2010 at 10:24 am
With total respect, I gotta disagree on some of your points. Not all, but some.
Nobody bid for Mascherano in July, Barca inquired last year. In August Barca put a couple of derisory bids in and LFC rightfully laughed them off (Hleb and someone else plus 12m, I think). A club has to stick to their guns and get what they think a player’s worth. Masch didn’t exactly submit a transfer request, and in March was raving about how he was going to sign a new contract at LFC so it seemed like things turned around for his family but he was keeping his toast buttered on both sides. As far as LFC were concerned Masch did want to go but nobody was offering anything to us for him so what could we do?
I don’t begrudge a guy his move but Masch is dead to most LFC fans after what he did to us at Man City. To pull out the night before/morning of a game, the whole team shunned him after that, such a vital game too where we were totally caned.
At a club where most fans would give anything for 90 seconds in a Red shirt he won’t even come out and fight one last time. We all knew Barca were going to come in with 20m pounds as they did, sitting the game out was a petulant slap in the face, especially after LFC took him from West Ham’s reserves.
I agree LFC didn’t handle this perfectly either of course (the upper level is a nightmare there at the moment) but the main thing I disagree with is that Masch sitting out instigated the move when the wheels were well in motion with Barca. Masch took 3m out of his pay packet to make the move happen, he was desperate but why not hand in a transfer request?
August 31st, 2010 at 12:32 pm
Always enjoy your comments. Thank you for taking the time to share your opinion.