Rickie Lambert has just secured his dream move, leaving Southampton to sign for Liverpool, the club he supported as a lad. Liverpool have got a striker who is in good form and just jetted off to the World Cup with his country. At the same time, Southampton have made a sale of nearly five million pounds, and Lambert gets to pull on the shirt he has always dreamed of wearing. Everybody wins, right? Wrong. Everybody loses, and heres why.
Let’s look at the man himself for a moment. Lambert, released by the Reds at the age of fifteen made his name at the likes of Stockport, Bristol Rovers and Rochdale before moving on to Southampton and becoming somewhat of a hero, helping them propel up the pyramid and not only keep them in the Premier League, but arguably turn Southampton into a Premier League mainstay for seasons to come. His fine form has resulted in a handful of England caps at the perfect time, scoring international goals at the ideal moment to convince England manager Roy Hodgson to take him to Brazil over the likes of Andy Carroll or Jermaine Defoe.
But I fear that his move is going to undo all of that, and that he will go from international and club regular to head benchwarmer. Not to the extent of Jack Rodwell of course, but surely even Lambert can recognise that only injury is going to allow him to break the monopoly that Messrs Suarez and Sturridge currently hold over the Liverpool front line. We’ve seen this kind of move before, where Liverpool have spent money on an in-form British striker, only for him to seemingly disappear into the ether and eventually show up at a smaller Premier League club: examples that spring to mind include Keane, Bellamy and even Crouch. Could it be then that Lambert has set himself up for a career defining fall, finding himself out of favour at Liverpool, destined to return to a club like Southampton, Newcastle et al on a loan deal with a view to a discounted permanent move?
I don’t think that this situation is Lambert’s fault though, assuming that fault is the right word. I can’t blame Lambert for seizing that opportunity to achieve a childhood dream, but I think that Liverpool can be held responsible for making him believe that this is going to work out. Liverpool have had their best Premier League season since 2008-09, and with a team that arguably very few would have predicted to even make the Europa League qualification spots. The strike partnership of Daniel Sturridge and Luis Suarez has made it the first time in more than fifty years that two Liverpool strikers have both scored more than twenty goals in a season. This of course coming at a time when Suarez was serving a ban, ruling him out for the first seven games of the season.
Arguably then the only way the club can go is up, and to do that they need to sign players capable of winning leagues, or having won them already. Is Lambert one of those players, or ever likely to be? Sadly, I’d say not. To Liverpool’s credit they are looking at the areas that do need to be improved. With Gerrard in the twilight of his career Liverpool have submitted a bid for one of Lambert’s old teammates, Adam Lallana. I genuinely think that he will become an England stalwart and that a move to Liverpool will do nothing but good for his career, as I think for him Southampton will become something of a glass ceiling. Liverpool could do with a strong defender to push the rather shaky partnership of Kolo Toure and Martin Skrtel, and they have gone to Saints again with rumoured interest in Dejan Lovren. At the time of writing, Liverpool are rumoured to be interested in one of Rodgers’ old goalkeepers, Swansea’s Michel Vorm. Brendan Rodgers has admitted that Liverpool’s plans are at least one season ahead of what was expected, and he has impressed with the attractive football currently being played at Anfield.
But I can’t see how this move benefits anyone other than the man with the nostalgia factor. Lambert is now 32 so hardly a signing for the future, and with two more than competent strikers already he isn’t going to march into the first team like he might have done had he signed for West Ham instead of turning down their January bid. For Liverpool there is a bit more of a benefit, as it provides cover and takes a bit of the pressure to step up away from Iago Aspas, a player that has hardly set the world alight since joining the Reds last summer. Assuming that Borini stays at Liverpool after his very successful loan period at Sunderland, Lambert could find himself as the fifth choice striker at worst, and Liverpool could end up essentially wasting one of their twenty five player slots that could go to a player that could benefit from it more. Even Southampton don’t hugely benefit, as they lose one of their best strikers at a time when Rodriguez is not fully recovered, and unless Southampton are able to find their version of Michu, £4.8m won’t buy much striker these days.
Of course, this is entirely my opinion, and if my recent post about Bayern Munich’s dominance is anything to go by, I have just set Lambert up to have the most prolific goalscoring record in Liverpool’s history. But what do you think? Have Liverpool made an excellent signing, or is this another example of a player fading into mediocrity? As always let me know in the comments below, or hit us up on twitter @weonlysingblog. Until next time my friends, пока!
We Only Sing When We're Winning 