Liverpool fans unite to put Newcastle in their place – do they just want Alexander Isak? – and celebrate PSR keeping them down.
Send your views on all things football to theeditor@football365.com
Carsley for England
I’m watching England’s Under 21s playing free flowing attacking football in the Euros semi-final against the Netherlands and I’m asking myself why don’t England’s senior team regularly play that way? Lee Carsley should be the senior team’s manager.
Dan, London
Oh Harvey Elliott…
The Will Ford article forgets one detail, Elliott grew up a Liverpool fan and no doubt has that same ingrained hatred of the club as we all do too.
Barry (Perth)
…This Elliott lad looks very handy, those goals were fantastic. Obviously looks very motivated, he’d save us a good few quid on some continental megasta….oh wait, never mind.
James, Liverpool
PSR isn’t the ‘enemy of ambition’…cheating isMay times I’ve wanted to write in but haven’t, this issue is getting right on my tits though, so here goes –
To James in this Wednesday’s mailbox, I hear your frustration and as a Liverpool fan, trust me, I’ve been there. But blaming PSR for Newcastle’s challenges isn’t it. It’s not the glass ceiling – it’s the reality of where your club is right now.
PSR didn’t stop Liverpool from losing Sterling to Man City, Torres to Chelsea, Alonso and Mascherano to Spain. It didn’t stop us from cashing in on Suarez or letting Emre Can leave on a free because we wouldn’t (or couldn’t) meet his wage demands. That was all before PSR even existed. Why? Because we weren’t big enough (commercially). Because our wage structure was tight. Because we hadn’t grown our revenues – yet.
And that’s the difference, they played the long game, sold smart, bought smarter and grew organically. If Newcastle stick with the plan, they’ll get there too – and they’ll have earned it. That’s what should make your rise special. It won’t be overnight and you know what It shouldn’t be. But it’ll mean something when you get there, most football fans, players, etc state that the pain and enjoyment of the journey – losses included, make the wins more enjoyable when they arrive.
What PSR does is protect the integrity of the competition, it stops clubs spending money they haven’t earned. The rules exist so that clubs aren’t bailed out by dodgy sponsorships or fictional deals with “sister companies”. That’s not ambition, that’s fantasy football with cooked books.
That’s why everyone (me) hates what City have done, because they didn’t grow, they gamed the system.
Shell sponsors, inflated revenue, dodging scrutiny for over a decade. That’s not a project – it’s a pyramid scheme with silverware.
Newcastle isn’t that and they shouldn’t want to be that. If you get to the top playing fair, then you’ll have done something no one can take away.
And this another pet hate of mine – clubs fans moaning that they have to sell youth players to ‘survive PSR’ – this is utter bollocks! There is no rule forcing them to do it, it’s a convenient short-term fix after poor decisions in the transfer market. Clubs want to show profit for this year, so they cash in on their brightest academy star to balance one season’s books, but its not long-term thinking, its kicking the can, and you know what they’ll be back in the same mess next transfer window, why? Because they’re idiots.
Chelsea selling hotels, the women’s team, internal assets is the same thing. Legal? Maybe. Sustainable? Not a chance. They’re just finding new creative ways to hit targets they set themselves with ludicrous overspending. It’s all smoke and mirrors, and it’ll catch up with them eventually.
Newcastle don’t need to follow that path. You’ve got a passionate fanbase, a brilliant coach, and the beginnings of a serious team. Will it mean missing out on players to Chelsea or United for now? Sometimes, yes. But that’s temporary. That’s the same frustration Liverpool faced before the trophies came.
So no, PSR isn’t ruining your ambition, it’s just asking you to build something lasting and when Newcastle (or any other club) finally get there, they’d have done it properly, without cheating, without loopholes , surely you’ll see it’ll be worth it, because you’ll have done it the right way. Just like Liverpool had to and honestly it is something to be proud of. (or at least I am)
Cheers F365 keep up the good work.
Ljdub – LFC stranded in Salford
READ: Who is in PSR bother and why can Liverpool spend, spend, spend?
…I really don’t mean for this to be aimed at James, NUFC because he is only the latest example for me to point at here. But I find it really interesting hearing Newcastle supporters talk about the way their club has been allowed to spend the last few years.
James mentions that “over the past couple of seasons Newcastle haven’t signed a first team player” and I have heard the same several times despite very easily retrievable evidence that it is absolutely not true.
Per Transfermarkt (who report fees in Euros so I will do the same) – Newcastle spent €68m in 2024/25 and €148m in 2023/24. By most metrics those can be considered “past couple seasons” and I know James considers them relevant, since he does reference the Minteh, Anderson, and Kelly sales.
Looking at those incomings – Tonali (€59m) and Livramento (€37m) are both first teamers, and Lewis Hall (€33m) and Harvey Barnes (€44m) were 11 and 12 in the minutes played column for NUFC this season despite some injuries. Surely these would all count as signing a first team player?
We all expected a certain level of NUFC supporters ignoring the icky nature of Saudi ownership to embrace the on-field success (proving that sportswashing is a very effective strategy), I’m a bit surprised at the extent to which they’ve done it but given the long trophy drought I understand it. But that doesn’t explain the collective memory-holing of significant, expensive first team signings by a large portion of the NUFC support.
I guess it doesn’t fit the “we haven’t bought anybody” narrative so they choose to ignore it, similar to the way the nature of the blood-soaked oil money is ignored when it successfully leads to trophies & CL appearances.
As for the reasons behind PSR (and FFP before it) – personally I do think the safety net that is aiming to prevent any clubs from going bust is worth the consequence of certain clubs not being able to spend their owners’ billions as quickly as they would sometimes like. I started to write “unintended consequence” but I suppose the spending restriction is very much PSR functioning as needed.
PSR/FFP’s original aim was preventing clubs at any point along the ladder from going bust, but at the top end it is still relevant. Just because the Saudis are currently in favour of supporting NUFC doesn’t mean that they won’t change their minds and dump the asset in the future. At which point NUFC supporters might very quickly be thankful that the club is run sustainably and new ownership can continue the success, rather than being a money pit sportswashing vehicle propped up by sham advertising deals from 115 otherwise non-existent sponsors who through a series of shell companies just so happen to be aligned to the club’s former owners.
But then again, I *am* a supporter of one of the Red Cartel clubs so why wouldn’t I be in favor of the glass ceiling holding clubs down (while also letting Man City slip the net and continue to spend whatever they want without constraint) :-).
Danny, LFC NY (now London)
Liverpool fan getting unashamedly cocky
Rival fans will call it arrogance and maybe they are right but they forget that one year ago they also made pretty bold claims. Like how Slot wouldn’t last the season, how we couldn’t make the top 4 let alone win the whole thing to how we would end up in a downward spiral (think United) only to swiftly backtrack and claim we were lucky and the league was just ‘weak’.
But you can’t have it both ways. If the league is ‘weak’ and ‘poor’ as you claimed then it shouldn’t bother you that some of us expect another easy title. Besides we have gotten stronger with our new signings while our closest rivals are arguably a bit weaker. The KDB and Partey replacements may somehow turn out to be better than their predecessors but I doubt that will happen in their first seasons.
Unsurprisingly, the 1 in 30 dig was thrown around but people forget that record is largely due to a certain Oil Club. City of course endured a difficult season inadvertently leading some to realize the sudden weak nature of the league.
The expectation is that they will be back to their usual levels next season. But what if they don’t? On paper at least I feel their squad gets weaker by the year. Their signings are a bit off. They will claim they did not have money for the perfect KDB replacement despite having spent close to 400m this year alone.
We all know that 2,3,4,5 or 6 years ago it would have been City splashing the cash for Wirtz with Liverpool settling for the ‘safe’ option. The table seems to have turned both on and off the pitch and I like it.
If City can’t do it then it will be left to Arsenal. Coming off the season everyone could see that they need a striker so it is rather amusing that they should prioritise changing their GKs yet again for no apparent reason, buying another midfielder and somehow want another Chelsea reject. They are a good team no doubt but the pressure will be on them to deliver which does not suit their self-imploding nature.
So yeah we fancy our chances alright.
Philip Correa
And one minute later…
It has been suggested that Florian Wirtz could flop but I think that is unlikely. Our last big money signing might have turned out to be an embarrassment but this is different.
Nunez was brought in to help fill the void left by Mane but instead of bringing the calm and composed finishes we were used to he brought chaos and erratic finishing. To say he struggled to fill Mane’s boots would be an understatement.
Florian won’t be replacing anybody unless we count Elliot (2 goal contributions in 18 appearances) who might be sold or Coutinho who left 7 years ago.
Part of the reason VVD and Alisson were big successes is that they arrived in similar circumstances and found themselves to be better just by default.
If Liverpool were given the chance to play both Karius and Mignolet in goal or just pick Alisson they would still choose Alisson. That’s how crap our goalkeeping options were before him.
Similarly VVD did not have to do a lot to impress. Matip aside most of our centre back options used to be a laughing stock. The likes of Klavan, Skrtel, Sakho and some guy I cant remember who used to be occasionally thrown upfront were calamities waiting to happen most times. How could VVD have failed when those were the standards that he found?
Similarly for Wirtz, he should find the bar to be low for a player of his quality. Szobo did improve later on in the season and he was the most productive Liverpool midfielder but his numbers won’t faze Florian.
I might be wrong but I don’t imagine the likes of Curtis Jones or Elliot walking straight into other elite teams the same way Wirtz would. That’s not including the lesser spotted Endo, Morton and the random kids we play in cups.
Simply put we don’t even have the depth in midfield to compete in all competitions, the shock defeat to Plymouth proved this.
Florian is a massive upgrade just by default. No chance he fails.
Philip Correa
READ: Wirtz, Delap, Cunha: Top 10 Premier League signings of the 2025 summer transfer window
The real key to Liverpool success
Reading all these laughable comments about how Liverpool have already won the league or how Wirtz is the new Pirlo etc etc is just non stop nonsense. There is only one thing that Liverpool’s entire season depends upon, the same way it has for the last 5 years or so.
How will Mo Salah perform?
That’s it. There is no other secret, no other tactics and masterclasses by anyone. If Salah has a bad season, Liverpool will struggle for top 4. If Salah performs his best season yet, Liverpool will be in the top 2 easily. The rest of the team can be alive, injured, disappeared, available etc and that makes 20% difference. That’s it. It could be Salah with 10 random Liverpool players and on his day there is no stopping Liverpool. It could be a terrible form Salah with TEN 100 million players around him and Liverpool have 0 chance at winning the league. I truly believe Salah deserves a Balon D’or for everything he has done, but glad he isn’t getting one 🙂.
I don’t know how this is even a discussion. The biggest and most interesting thing about Liverpool is to see how a 400k a week, 33 year old Salah on a new contract performs. I am hoping it goes the Alexis Sanchez way, but Salah can always prove anyone including all the haters wrong.
Aman (If Liv get a 25 goals a season striker, then this theory goes out the window)
Man Utd won’t be that bad again…
I can see the logic in thinking Man U will have another terrible season, but they may as well not.
Last season they had new owners still finding their feet, gave a chance to a manager that they quite clearly didn’t really want, brought in a new manager with a very rigid system, who wasn’t keen to join mid-season and had plenty of matches where they maybe didn’t deserve to win, but could have, with a little luck.
If you look at the typical PL season, teams very often do surprisingly well, following on from awful seasons.
They are obviously not going to get near the top, but I think they could have a very decent season, if some things fall for them.
Andreas (in hot Belgium, trying to place bets on the Club World Cup, without any luck)