If we are letting go of Ings, Lallana and supposedly DS, Milner and Clyne (I prefer to keep these 3 with us), where do we stand on the home grown quota then for the league and also what happens to the CL homegrown quota. Wouldn't we be in trouble? Should we look at replacing these players with players who qualify as homegrown then? And pay English premium?
First of all, it's not a question of "if" we let Ings go, given that it's a loan move with an "
obligation" to buy at the end of the season. He's gone.
That said, the current squad situation regarding homegrown players is as outined below.
Firstly, the squad size as per Uefa rules is 21, plus 4 homegrown and 4 club-trained, as quoted in the
Echo:
UEFA rules dictate two players must be goalkeepers, and at least eight places must go to locally trained players.
Locally trained players are either club-trained players who have been on Liverpool's books for three years between the ages of 15 and 21, or association-trained players whose careers spanned the same period at another English club.
No more than four association-trained players can be included in the eight local nominees on List A. And if a club can only field seven locally trained players, their squad size is reduced to 24 (or six down to 23, five to 22 and so on)."
Essentially, that means that the squad can be broken down as:
- 17 non-homegrown players;
- 4 who are association-trained;
- 4 who are club-trained; and
- An unlimited number of u21 players who have been at the club for 2+ years
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The current state of the squad is as follows (ages in brackets):
Not homegrown or club-trained (maximum 17 allowed)
1. Alisson (26)
2. Mignolet (30)
3. Van Dijk (27)
4. Lovren (29)
5. Moreno (26)
6. Robertson (24)
7. Matip (27)
8. Fabinho (25)
9. Wijnaldum (27)
10. Keita (23)
11. Shaqiri (27)
12. Firmino (27)
13. Mané (26)
14. Salah (26)
15. Origi (23)
Association-trained
16. Clyne (27)
17. Milner (32)
18. Henderson (28)
19. Lallana (30)
20. Sturridge (29)
21. Solanke (21)
(Note: Neither Oxlade-Chamberlain (25) or Markovic (24) are included in this years Uefa CL squad, though 3 changes are permitted in January before the start of the CL knockouts).
Locally-trained
22. N/A
23. N/A
24. N/A
25. N/A
List B (i.e. Locally-trained, and born after January 1, 1997)
Trent, Gomez, Kelleher, Grabara, Phillips, Jones, Brewster (plus Wilson, Woodburn, Kent, etc going forwards)
(Note: "List B" = players born after January 1 1997 and have spent at least two uninterrupted years at Liverpool).
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What to make of this?
First of all, it's hugely beneficial that Gomez and Trent are u21 and club-trained. Once they turn 21 they will both be on the "locally trained" list, which is a huge asset in terms of homegrown rules going forwards. Their status has already been hugely beneficial this year as it's allowed Klopp to include Origi and Solanke in the Uefa squad rather than leaving them out for European games entirely.
As a whole, the squad has only 15 (of a possible 17) foreign players, which leaves plenty of flexibility in terms of new signings. That is even more true given that Mignolet, Moreno, and Origi are all rumoured to be likely to move on soon, and their exits would mean that Liverpool would only have 12 foreign players on the list going forwards, thus leaving a possible 5 of 17 spaces open.
On the whole, the situation is clearly extremely good. That said, there are two important things to keep an eye on going forwards:
1. Firstly, most of the homegrown players are around 30 years old. Henderson (28) recently signed a 5 year extension until 2023, but the phasing out of the others appears to have been planned for, given that Clyne (27), Lallana (30) and Milner (32) have contracts that expire in June 2020, and Sturridge's (29) expires in 2019. The future of Solanke (21) in the squad isn't certain either, so long-term it appears as if only Henderson and Ox are certainties out of this group.
2. Secondly, most of the key players in the squad are around 25-27 years old, which is very healthy. However, only Robertson (24) and Keita (23) are under 25 years old (not including club-trained players or Origi who appears set to leave). There also isn't a single under-23 player on List A (i.e. homegrown/foreign). With that in mind, it is surely a priority going forwards to bring in young players to establish continuity long-term, and guard against a situation where the entire team declines at once.
Looking at the future...
The squad is clearly in a very healthy position, not only in terms of quality, but also in terms of both age profile and Uefa homegrown rules.
The makeup of the squad means that there is great flexibility in terms of new signings. That said, given the aging profile of the homegrown players (i.e. most of them are around 30), as well as the limited number of players under 25 (and no foreign players under 23), it must surely be a priority for the club to recruit one or two young players in the next couple of years - ideally homegrown.
So to answer the question in the quoted post above, if all the players mentioned were to leave (i.e. Clyne, Milner, Lallana, Sturridge, and Ings), and assuming that Gomez and Trent are 21 by the time the aforementioned players left, that would leave the makeup of homegrown/club-trained as what is listed below.
18. Henderson
19. Ox
20. Solanke
21. N/A
--
22. Gomez
23. Trent
24. n/a
25. n/a
The list above would be absolutely fine and wouldn't cause any problems whatsoever, even if there were 17 non-association trained players in the squad. It would however mean that once you have 17 players the next players to be added would have to be homegrown (to fill #21 in the list above) or replace one of the 17 foreign players like-for-like.
All-in-all, the squad is in great position, and there's a ton of flexibility going forwards so the club won't need to force any signings just to fulfil quotas, which will be useful in terms of avoiding that infamous "homegrown premium".
