Liverpool: 5 Biggest Questions Brendan Rodgers Must Answer This Summer

If Brendan Rodgers thought last summer was hard, the upcoming one is surely going to be a lot tougher.

Big decisions need to be made without the aid of significant experience in managing teams such as Liverpool. Guiding factors for Rodgers are few, and his judgment with respect to time will be crucial too. So without any further chitchat, let us analyse five of the biggest questions that Rodgers will have to answer this summer.

Does he need Luis Suarez?

The cliche of no player being bigger than the club rings true and very appropriately too in such a scenario. However, from the viewpoint of the manager, if Liverpool does not achieve Champions League football again, Rodgers will come under severe pressure. So can he take the hit of losing his most influential player, albeit with possibly a huge load of cash to find alternatives?

Having a lot of cash in such a case carries with it a very notable caveat: Liverpool may not be able to tempt the really top players without European football to offer. Hence, it will arguably be Rodgers trying to do a Billy Beane and getting players that would in sum be more effective than what Suarez offered.

Unfortunately baseball and football can never be compared.

So does Rodgers not have an option? Does he desperately need Suarez next season? Well, not in my opinion.

Toward the end of last season, Rodgers and his team showed that a drop in individual quality on the field does not necessarily mean inferior performances in what is still very much a team sport. Thus, even though only one player can replace Suarez in the playing 11, it does not mean he has to be more influential than the Uruguayan for Liverpool to do better.

Strikers in football are generally the most expensive commodities. So why not invest the money in the coffers (if it were to happen) from the sale of Suarez in improving the average strength of the playing 11 rather than looking for a replacement who might be redundant anyway considering some of our new signings.

In case Rodgers thinks he needs Suarez, he may be able to convince Suarez to stay by proving Liverpool’s ambition through activity in the transfer market. The other side to this may even be that Suarez has come out in the press to state his intentions to urge the owners to spend.      

Does he have the right backup plan?

In case Suarez leaves, Rodgers needs to have a good backup plan. In my opinion he has probably even started to address that situation. The two Spaniards that Liverpool has signed signal the gaffer’s intentions to have attacking talent as backup in case Suarez’s transfer does materialize without enough time to spend for replacements.

Only having a backup plan will not suffice, though. Rodgers needs to have the right one for what is not only a crucial season but also one that has lots of opportunities and probable surprises to offer. The two Spaniards Liverpool has brought in are from a different league and could prove ineffective, at least until they acclimatize and adjust.

Daniel Sturridge will thus prove very important for the Liverpool boss this season. For all you know, Rodgers may not have to look at the backup plan at all in case Suarez decides to give his career at Liverpool one more season. Even so, planning for the possible is definitely something that a good manager does, and so it is imperative that Rodgers keeps an answer to this question ready, just in case.

Who should go out on loan?

A few of the youngsters got good amount of game time last season because Liverpool’s squad was very thin. The forecast this year, however, is not as rosy.

Rodgers wants more experience and depth, and rightly so. Taking hints from early signs, I believe he will strengthen the squad a great deal, leaving the youngsters needing to be loaned out to maintain their development.

So who should go out on loan? Raheem Sterling and Suso definitely stick out as the main candidates for getting playing time and confidence in teams where they will be able to exert more influence. Andre Wisdom can possibly be added to that list if additions in the defense department are on their way to Anfield in the form of more transfers this summer.

Who else? I would like to see Adam Morgan and Jack Robinson being loaned out again for a few months at least. They need to get some sort of signal to keep them on their toes so that their performances do not dip and they have a chance for the future first team.

In the case of Conor Coady, Jordon Ibe and Jerome Sinclair, the players and team both may be better served if these youngsters contribute with their performances in the Capital One Cup and possibly even the early stages of the FA Cup.   

Which players had enough time and which deserve one more season?

There are some players who have had their chance and others who have not. The manager has got to take vital decisions to free up funds and minimize the perceived redundancy in the Liverpool squad.

Jordan Henderson is one who probably is at Liverpool for the long term, and Rodgers will wait on him to see if something special develops. Stewart Downing, on the other hand, will need to raise his game if he wants to see game time as much as he did last season. He too will probably remain in the team for the next season at least.

Oussama Assaidi and Jonjo Shelvey are the two players who will most likely be sold this summer. Despite the fact that both are not bad players, they might not appeal to Rodgers and his thinking. I may not concur with Rodgers’ decision to sell both these players, as they offer something different to Rodgers’ vision by changing the one-dimensional look of Liverpool’s play. However, this is unfortunately the most likely situation.

Apart from this, Daniel Pacheco may be sold, which will be very sad indeed. It just goes to show that having talent is not even half the battle.

  

How much should he shake it up without disturbing the momentum?

Rodgers has shown his desire to bring in players to add depth to the squad. He is very rightly targeting a good mix of players who can go into the first team and those who would improve the squad as a whole.

This definitely allows Rodgers the liberty of not including many new faces in the first team straight away. This team has slowly started to jell together, and the last thing Liverpool fans want is more time to see results.

Rodgers is very shrewdly targeting the appropriate mix of players to sign that do not have the “star” label attached to them. Thus they will not have the ego that compels certain players to start believing that they should start every game. At the same time, it will raise everyone’s level of performance as players know from the first season that Rodgers will certainly pick on merit.

This makes it easier for the manager to manage player expectations as well as not shake up the team to the extent that would start creating ripples and have an adverse effect on performance and momentum.

Rodgers will want to keep the majority of the players that played the last game of last season on the pitch come the first day of the new league campaign against Stoke at Anfield this August. Even more so when the fixture list has been very kind to the Reds this season and there cannot be any excuses whatsoever for not starting well. 

What do you think? Feel free to give your thoughts in the comments section below.