Lawro: "Joe Cole and Liverpool are a perfect fit"
Published 23:00 19/07/10 By Mark Lawrenson
Joe Cole and Liverpool are a perfect fit - a really good move for player and club.
Assuming his knee is okay - and he trained and played for England at the World Cup - then you’ve got a fit player with miles on the clock.
A player who is extremely fresh and just wants to play. He has come into the club under a new manager and he is that manager’s choice.
The sums also make sense as Yossi Benayoun had two years left on his contract and went for £5million.
If things don’t work out for Joe at Anfield then he can simply move on and the club would get a decent transfer fee for him.
But to be honest the fans will love him. And if you’re Fernando Torres or Steven Gerrard and you were thinking of leaving, you’d maybe think: ‘Hang on a minute. The club are showing a bit of ambition here’.
Joe has gone to a club not in the Champions League because he is going to play regularly and there is no doubt that a fit Joe Cole playing regularly will make Liverpool stronger.
People talk about him not going to Spurs or Arsenal but the bottom line is that he would not have been getting as much first team action as both those clubs have got loads of forwards.
But Joe will now give Roy Hodgson options at Liverpool. He can play right side, left side or off the forward.
As things stand now - assuming the players stay - I see them lining up in a 4-2-3-1 with Cole right side in a three behind the striker, Gerrard playing off Torres and Milan Jovanovic on the left.
As for this business with Javier Mascherano not returning Hodgson’s calls, well we live in a such a technological age that there’s no other conclusion to draw than a sign of disrespect.
The thing is, this is where Mascherano could have used his agent to get on the phone and just be honest with Roy and say: “I want to leave”.
Roy has been around the block. He’d know how to handle things the right way. He’d have the time to get a replacement in and all this could have been avoided.
Let’s hope there can yet be a conclusion to this that suits all parties.
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