\n<\/p>\n
There is an obvious risk, then, that the connection between Liverpool and its followers will only be further weakened by the absence of local lads on the pitch. Club legend Steven Gerrard even admitted earlier this summer that he was dead against selling Jones for the simple fact that he was a Scouser born and bred.<\/span><\/p>\n “I just think that, naturally, being around Liverpool, growing up in the city, we understand the demands of the club, the style, what the fans want,” <\/span>the former Reds captain and youth-team coach told <\/span>BFM Radio<\/em><\/i>. \u201cIt\u2019s embedded in us because we know the city inside out. For that reason, I think the academy at our club is crucial, as I think it’s key that we keep producing homegrown talent.<\/span><\/p>\n “Liverpool have always been very good at that. If you look back, Michael Owen, Jamie Carragher, Robbie Fowler, Steve McManaman, Trent Alexander-Arnold, myself, even the likes of players like Jay Spearing and Stephen Warnock who don\u2019t play the [same] amount of games, they come into the team and they understand the values and the principles of what we\u2019re about.”<\/span><\/p>\n The aforementioned Carragher, though, is no longer entirely sure that Liverpool are about, at least in terms of their player recruitment. <\/span><\/p>\n “What we did last summer, I didn’t really like it,” <\/span>the ex-Liverpool defender told <\/span>Football Ramble<\/em><\/i>.<\/span> “It felt like a Real Madrid summer \u2013 Florian Wirtz, Alexander Isak, we’re gonna get Hugo Ekitike, another striker, for \u00a380m even though we’ve got one for \u00a3125m.<\/span><\/p>\n “This summer, it’s all about Bradley Barcola. What about the days we had before when we built that team under Klopp and we were getting players who people weren’t quite sure about and getting great value? I almost want to go back to that.” Carragher’s certainly not alone in that regard, but it seems that Liverpool, just like the game itself, are moving in the opposition direction. <\/span><\/p>\n Of course, the academy is not without representation in the current squad. Rio Ngumoha may have been signed from Chelsea but he’s technically a former youth team player, while Trey Nyoni was an unused substitute in the Carabao Cup win over Chelsea that filled Klopp with such a sense of pride and is set to feature prominently this season. The soon-to-be fit-again Danns could also come back into the first-team picture, given Isak is Liverpool’s only orthodox No.9 with Ekitike likely to be sidelined until 2027.<\/span><\/p>\n As Carragher has noted, though, there has been a noticeable shift in recruitment strategy at Anfield, with the four most expensive signings in the club’s history all made in the past two summer transfer windows, and that’s made it even more difficult for homegrown talent to break through. <\/span><\/p>\n Indeed, having signed Barcola from Paris Saint-Germain just before the close of the summer transfer window, the Reds are now in a position to field three \u00a3100m-plus players in Friday’s Premier League meeting with Ipswich Town at Portman Road – yet Iraola won’t have a single local lad to choose from.<\/span><\/p>\n In that sense, Klopp was correct: Liverpool’s Carabao Cup triumph was unique, and unlikely to ever be repeated. And not just because it’s so difficult to win trophies with kids. It’s also down to the fact that some people in and around Anfield seem to have forgotten that having a Scouse soul means more than absolutely everything else. <\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There is an obvious risk, then, that the connection between Liverpool and its followers will…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25488,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25487","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25487","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25487"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25487\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/25488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25487"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}