The Off-season - New players
Despite the success of Tom Murray as a backup striker (he was the Players player of the Year!), the reality is that he is now 31 years old and I'm not sure how much longer he can keep playing at the level that he is playing at. To ensure he keeps playing well, I intend to drop him in the reserves and limit his playing time so that he is fresh in the games he does play (similar to what I did for Tom Anderson.
Mauricio Torres - a young 23 year old striker from Werder Bremen who I signed for GBP12.5M to replace Murray as backup striker. My scouts reported him as a useful addition to the squad and I actually think he will be able to do a good job as back up as he has some good heading stats. Together with Darren Barber (who I intend to primarily use as a striker this year), I think I have a pretty good lineup of backup strikers.
Daniel Santos - another young player. I signed Santos for GBP11.5M from Betis and he will slot in as backup RM behind Oliveira. I signed Santos primarily because I needed more cover at RM as I wanted to play Barber in his natural striker position. Although Santos has been scouted as being a potential superstar for the future, he wasn't actually my first choice signing (my first choice was an established player who was looking for guaranteed first team football).
Giuseppe Pellegrino - a 22 year old GK who I signed for GBP2.5M from Man Utd. NeitherVan Dijk nor Orlando are spring chickens and Pellegrino was signed to give me extra cover at the GK position. To be honest, Pellegrino will probably hang around for a couple of years before moving on. Although I signed him for extra cover, the reality is that GKs can play for longer than outfield players and I don't really see Pellegrino being able to break into the first team. Still, I've been wrong before and even if I'm not wrong, he is still a cheap backup GK option.
Players sold
In addition to Carlos Sanchez, I actually sold quite a lot of players this year.
Marcio - the biggest surprise sell was Marcio. Marcio has been a regular in the side (30+ appearances each year) for six years now. Although coming in as a squad player, he was able to become a key part of my MC after Dembele became too old to play MC regularly. However, Marcio is now 32 years old and when an offer came in from Newcastle for GBP10M, it was just too good to refuse especially considering how well Mike Patterson had been doing in the games in which I played him. Anyway, considering I got him as a free transfer, this ended up being a very nice piece of wheelin' n dealin'.
Andrea de Luca - I was disappointed with de Luca's performance this year. Although he played well, he didn't get many assists (only 3 by the end of the year and the first one in March). For a player who broke into the first team on his ability to create chances by crossing into the box, that is a pretty poor return. Despite this, I wasn't actually planning on selling him. However, when an offer of GBP10M came in from Chelsea, I decided to cash in. Michael Parsons, who has done well in the games I played him in will make the step up to first team.
John Turner - this is an interesting case. A product of the Liverpool youth system, Turner was never able to break into the first team despite showing early promise. When he turned 24 last year, he started to bitch about being in the reserves all the time at which point I put him on the transfer list. At this point, he started playing like a madman. In fact, he played so well that I ended up playing him in a lot of games this year as a backup M LC (10 starts and 9 subs) - particularly in cup games or against poor opposition. When he got his playing time in the first team, he continued to do really well and I took him off the transfer list. Naturally, at this point, other teams noticed how well he was doing and I ended up selling him for GBP2.2M (which was his market value) when Man City came knocking for him.
Other than the above, I sold off a couple of other reserve players but nobody really worth mentioning.
The new look Liverpool squad below.
Coaches
In the last couple of seasons, I've also completely revamped my coaching system. In the past, when players retired, I would offer them a coaching position if they were good players. I used to do this even if their coaching stats weren't particularly good as I was hoping that their stats would improve over time.
However, I don't think this version of FM supports that as none of my coaches actually showed much improvement. After a fairly long while of waiting in vain, I eventually decided to replace all my average coaches with decent coaches as their contracts ran out.
This process has been completed and you can see my new look coaching system below. The only remaining coach who isn't there on merit is Gerry Cheng, who is also my Ass Man. Unfortunately, I just can't bring myself to sack his sorry ass so I guess I will just have to live with the nepotism.
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