A collage of Ruben Amorim, Mo Salah and Pep Guardiola. (Photos by Alex Livesey/Getty Images, Carl Recine/Getty Images and Justin Setterfield/Getty Images)
In his exclusive column for CaughtOffside, former Aston Villa attacker Stan Collymore discusses some of football’s biggest talking points, including why Ruben Amorim should put every Man United player up for sale, does Pep Guardiola still have the fire at Man City, why Liverpool must break the bank to keep Mo Salah and a mixed back of results for English teams in the Champions League.
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Champions League a mixed bag for English teams
Diego Carlos of Aston Villa fouls Michele Di Gregorio of Juventus
Diego Carlos of Aston Villa fouls Michele Di Gregorio of Juventus, before Morgan Rogers of Aston Villa goes on to score a goal which is later ruled out following a VAR Review. (Photo by Ryan Pierse/Getty Images)
The Champions League for English teams this week was a mixed bag really.
Manchester City are just in the middle of a massive rut and need to get a clean sheet and back on track otherwise they’re going to be left behind in the Premier League and, potentially, not qualify for those top eight positions in the Champions League.
After all of the newspaper chatter about Mo Salah, it’s nice that other Liverpool players were weighing in to help keep them top of the group in the Champions League by a couple of points. Cody Gakpo showed his importance in another absolutely sensational five-star performance from Liverpool.
I think it was a more pragmatic approach from Aston Villa for their game against Juventus, defending well in a low block after recent defensive aberrations, just to give themselves a little bit more stability and not get done in behind.
They were a little bit nervy and edgy first off, but in the second half they came out and they were more adventurous.
To be honest, at the end of the game, they were on the wrong end of a terrible decision. The ball was dropped by Juve’s goalkeeper and, with the last kick of the game, Morgan Rogers scores. It should have stood because it was really soft from the officials. Arguably, that gets given in the Premier League but not in the Champions League.
Villa are on 10 points and averaging two points a game in Europe and I’d take that all day long.
I don’t think anybody expected Arsenal to go to Lisbon and score as freely as they did. It was a really good overall performance, which should kick-start some life back into their Premier League campaign and add some belief that they can go on and do effectively what the teams have tried to do over Manchester City in recent seasons, which is clawing back a points gap.
With that performance and that score line against Sporting, it’s a point in the season where Mikel Arteta can say ‘this is what we can do against a team when we’re on form, now let’s take that into the Premier League.’
Liverpool should break the bank to keep Mo Salah
Mohamed Salah of Liverpool runs with the ball under pressure
Mohamed Salah of Liverpool runs with the ball under pressure from Endrick of Real Madrid. (Photo by Justin Setterfield/Getty Images)
How much is it going to cost to replace Mo Salah?
If you look around European football, there isn’t a glut of quality, young ‘Mo Salah’s’ that have the outrageous pace that he still has. Let’s not forget, one of the big things about players when they age is that their pace goes, but there’s no sign of that at all.
Salah’s ability to get into excellent positions and be clinical is still top class, his goals and assist output is still there, and he’s no trouble.
Even if you look at it from a marketing perspective, whether it be the fact that he’s a high profile Muslim player from a football mad Egypt where players have huge global recognition, or otherwise, offering Salah a new deal makes absolute sense for Liverpool.
I’m sure Liverpool haven’t ignored it, and I don’t think there’s a situation brewing, it’s just a classic game of brinkmanship, where the player or the agent says ‘Oh, woe is me, I’m not feeling the love.’
The club will make appropriate comments at the right time, but I think that Liverpool as a business and FSG as a business will be looking at the situation and wanting to get the numbers right before any negotiations are entered into. They need to make sure the numbers work then move forward with Mo in their squad.
Unless the Saudis want to pay a ridiculous amount of money in January for Liverpool to sell him early, then the maths are very much on Liverpool paying the 350 grand a week.
He’s a Liverpool legend, he’s won everything there is to win, and he’s still very, very capable as an A class performer to get Liverpool winning trophies. That has to be worth the spend.
Amorim should put every Man United star up for sale
Ruben Amorim, Manager of Manchester United, speaks to the media
Ruben Amorim, Manager of Manchester United, speaks to the media on November 27, 2024. (Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images)
I think that we’ll look back in five years and say this was Ruben Amorim’s first XI that he played as Man United Head Coach (against Ipswich) and we’ll be aghast when comparing it.
He will, by then, have assembled a group of young, hungry and experienced players that can create chances, play the way that he wants to play and get to a point of having a Manchester United that can compete for a Premier League title or a Champions League.
I think that if he has the wind in his sails and the correct support from the new recruitment structure that Manchester United now have, I think he can be successful.
But in terms of players, I think that they’re all up for sale. I think that every single player – Casemiro, Amad, Rashford or whoever it is – at this point in time should be available for sale until the time where Amorim has played them for 15 to 20 games and they’ve proven that they can produce consistent nine out of 10 performances.
Rashford scoring within 30 seconds against Ipswich but then doing nothing else for the rest of the game… we’ve seen this before and not just with him either.
Can we honestly say, with our hands on our hearts, that there is one Manchester United player that is a consistent title winning player? The answer is no.
When Zirkzee first came it was ‘great, he’s the future, he’s a ball playing, ball carrying number 10 that can get in the box’ but he’s already dropped off a cliff.
The reality is that I could pick out any names that Manchester United could build around, but I would be lying to myself as a pundit to say that I could guarantee that any of these guys will be relevant in 20 to 25 games time.
Amorim needs to do what Arne Slot has done. Give everybody a chance, and slowly but surely implement his system, making sure he’s got players to play that system.
He can then go to the board and the technical staff at the end of the season, or even before then – around May time – and say ‘I want to keep him, him and him, he could fit into the system, these can’t.’
Does Pep Guardiola still have the energy and the stomach for the fight?
Pep Guardiola, Manager of Manchester City, reacts
Pep Guardiola reacts during Man City’s match against Feyenoord. (Photo by Carl Recine/Getty Images)
It’s very simple. Football goes in cycles. It happened to Wenger, happened to Ferguson, happened to Sacchi and it’s happened to every manager that has been at a club for over five or six years.
Two or three things happen.
One, the manager becomes less passionate because younger coaches like Amorim come in that are itching to get out on the training ground like Pep was at Barcelona. In Pep’s case his agitation and his constant need for perfection has a shelf life.
In the same way a great rock band would like to think that they can play Wembley Stadium forever, the reality is that your powers wane. You get older, you become less capable.
Secondly, sometimes players need new voices and stimuli in the dressing room. Just like Jurgen Klopp when he left Liverpool, people thought that any new man wouldn’t be able to match Klopp’s personality, but Arne Slot comes in with a different voice and a different methodology, and it’s so far so very good in terms of it working.
Thirdly, everybody knows that Man City are an aging squad. Bernardo Silva, Ilkay Gundogan, Kyle Walker, Kevin De Bruyne… it’s a squad that’s creaking around the seams.
I have to say too that precious little analysis has gone into some of the signings that Pep’s got wrong. Jack Grealish at his best does what De Bruyne does; creates chances, scores goals, but nobody’s mentioned he hasn’t scored in this this calendar year so far.
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Erling Haaland will score goals if you give him a regular supply line but that’s obviously been an issue at the moment too.
Finally, the charges hanging over the club can’t be ignored.
I think a lot of players are looking around thinking I’ve won everything there is to win, I’ve won most of it multiple times, I can go anywhere and any club on earth will more than likely take me.
Agents chat to players and go ‘if you want your brand to be untainted, do you really want to be potentially playing in the second or third tier?’
It’s a relatively minor thing at the moment and it’ll be nothing more than a conversational issue for now, but it’ll become louder as and when there are any significant punishments meted out.
With so many decent caliber managers in the Premier League now – Amorim, Slot, Iraola, Emery etc – the biggest question mark is whether Pep still has the inner belief, the energy and will to win now that he’s signed that new two year contract?