Former Liverpool player John Aldridge has reflected on the transfer battle between Chelsea and Liverpool for Moises Caicedo.
Caicedo is a very good player, make no mistake about it. He is not worth the £115million Chelsea are going to pay for him, but who is worth that? It seemed Liverpool were on course to sign Caicedo on Friday, but things soon changed.
As soon as the player made clear he wanted to go to Chelsea over Liverpool, I didn’t want him at all. We are far bigger than Chelsea will ever be.
Missing out on this transfer has not hurt me like when Torres left us to go there, that was awful and hard to stomach. Going to Chelsea? When I was at Oxford United, we beat them three times in the space of four months. They have bought their way to where they are.
In terms of the reasons behind Caicedo choosing Chelsea over Liverpool, they are a London club and some players see that as a big pull.
With the Louis Vuitton shop on Oxford Street and the London way of life, they view that as a huge attraction. Chelsea have got that, but they haven’t got the same selling point of Liverpool Football Club history.
We are a massive club in world football and that will always be there. If Caicedo wants to go to Chelsea, good riddance. We have to overcome this and trust Jurgen to get a player who can do that job.
The one thing I can’t understand with this whole thing is Chelsea’s integrity. They agreed to sign Tyler Adams from Leeds United, the medical was done, and they have seemingly pulled out to put the money towards Caicedo.
How does that lad feel now? Adams now has to bounce back up to Leeds and wait for someone else. That is shocking and is a sign of the people now running Chelsea.
They have bought nearly a full squad and got rid of a full team in six months. That is not football as we know it. Todd Boehly is playing the system by handing out eight-year contracts and I hope it implodes on them.
He thinks this is a baseball team, that’s what they must do over in America. They have got a really good manager in Pochettino, who will guide them through this, but time will only tell as to whether they can get this right.
Our owners have had some stick in recent times, but they have clearly got money to spend. Whether or not this money was there for Jude Bellingham, we don’t know. With Bellingham, he must have just wanted to go to Real Madrid.
If Liverpool was his primary choice, it would have been done. It’s there in black and white now. He must have been seeking the sun in Spain and playing for a massive club in La Liga. Good luck to him.
The problem this has created is that if we go in for a player now, we will be held to ransom. It was always a game of cards with Caicedo, and we’ve shown our hand to the rest of the Premier League. Teams will want a little bit more than they were originally looking for now.
