TO FLOP STARS KEITA’S ROUGH RETURN
looking for a club in Europe and has ended up at a poor Ajax, and his form has been abject.
Sadio Mane had a disastrous season at Bayern Munich and is now going through the motions in Saudi.
The same applies to his former Liverpool team-mates Fabinho and Roberto Firmino.
In the rst half of Klopp’s tenure, Giorginio Wijnaldum played a massive role in mid eld.
He moved on three years ago after being offered huge wages by Paris Saint-germain.
But he spent most of his time there on PSG’S bench, and was booed by his own fans on some of his appearances for the club.
He lasted just two seasons with 31 appearances, and he too has joined the Saudi exodus too.
Wijnaldum plays for Al-ettifaq, managed by Steven Gerrard.
They play in a 35,000 capacity stadium that has rarely hosted more than 7000.
In one game this season, Wijnaldum played in front of just 696 fans.
Of course, the biggest op of all has been Philippe Coutinho.
Enabled
It’s well known by now that the Klopp revolution was largely enabled by his mega money transfer to Barcelona as it enabled the German to sign both Virgil van Dijk and Alisson Becker.
Coutinho had a nightmare spell at Barcelona but, like quite a few others, he did come up against the Lionel
Messi problem.
Both he and Messi essentially wanted to play in the same position.
Coutinho isn’t an easy player to accommodate in your team.
He can be out of the game for long, long spells and then win a game in a ash. He can often be seen as a luxury.
There was a sentimental return to the Premier League with Aston Villa but he only showed glimmers of what he used to do.
At just 31, Coutinho is playing out time on loan at Al-duhail in Qatar.
He has managed just two goals in a league ranked by FIFA as the 75th strongest in the world, just ahead of Thailand.
Coutinho’s top level career is effectively over.
There is a bit of nervousness around Liverpool, and not just because of Klopp’s imminent departure.
Next season, Mohamed Salah, Trent Alexanderarnold and van Dijk will enter the last year of their contracts.
Will they stay on, especially as Klopp won’t be there?
Lesson
Will the new manager want all three of them?
They should bear in mind is the lesson of history.
Faraway hills have rarely been green for players from Klopp’s Liverpool era aterwards.
IT HAS been anything but a happy return to Germany for Naby
Keita since leaving Liverpool at the end of the 2022-23 season.
The Guinean mid elder, once the Reds’ most expensive signing after joining from RB
Leipzig in 2017, left to join Bundesliga side Werder Bremen.
After the rst half of his return season to the Bundesliga was plagued by injuries, the second half of the campaign has been equally as disappointing for Keita and stooped to a new low on Sunday afternoon after he was absent from Bremen’s Bundesliga clash with Bayer Leverkusen at the Bay Arena.
According to the club’s managing director, Clemens Fritz,
Keita opted not to travel with the rest of the Bremen squad after learning that he would not be starting.
Disputes
Keita, though, disputes the Fritz claims and insisted he would not “accept any person trying to tarnish my image” and he “never had any problems with discipline”.
Either way, it doesn’t make the mid elder’s below-par return to the Bundesliga any better. Alex Oxladechamberlain, meanwhile, is enjoying a productive rst season with Turkish Super Lig side Besiktas after quitting An eld for Turkey last summer.
The England international, who spent ve years at An eld after signing from Arsenal in 2017, has made 15 league appearances this term, scoring four goals and laying on one assist as
Besiktas push for a Champions League place in the nal weeks of the season.