Players coming back from injury are not ‘like a new signing’.
By David Gate
We need to stop saying returning players will be ‘like a new signing’. Only new players and transfers make that difference.
After Liverpool defeated Hertha Berlin 3-0 on Saturday, Adam Lallana was quoted as saying that having Daniel Sturridge back at full fitness is ‘like a new signing’, Actually he said two new signings. This cliché is trotted out every year to perk fans up during underwhelming parts of the transfer window and frankly, it has to stop.
It makes no sense. Of course we are all happy to see Ings, Gomez and Sturridge return from injury. But the only way they can be like ‘new signings’ is if we had no injuries this year. No injuries. At all. To anyone.
Yet we absolutely will have injuries. Probably lots of them. Would you bet any money that the three players above stay fit for the whole season? Me, neither. In fact, Joe Gomez is already injured. So he is not like a new signing more like an old signing we don’t see very often. Like a recurring character on a TV show. Ah, yes, remember him?
I get that we are always looking for encouragement for the Reds; finding hope wherever we can. This is fine but we also have to be intellectually honest about it all.
For example, we would never say the inverse. When a player gets injured for six months we don’t say ‘It’s like we sold him to Bayern Munich on a free transfer’. That would be stupid. But it’s just the same logic reversed.
A player is coming back from injury? Great. Awesome. Good news. Up the Reds!
But the only players who are like new signings are, you know, actual new signings.