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Liverpool must improve squad quickly or risk losing our best players, says goalkeeper Pepe Reina
Pepe Reina says Liverpool must do all they can — including immediate investment in the transfer market — to ensure they finish as high as possible in the league to have a fighting chance of retaining their most valuable players.
The future of the goalkeeper, as well as that of his Spanish international team-mate, Fernando Torres, has been subject to intense scrutiny amid suggestions both fear Liverpool’s fall from grace will take years for the club’s new owners, New England Sports Ventures, to rectify.
Reina has committed himself to Anfield until the end of the season, but he has stopped short of discussing his plans beyond that point.
His suggestion that a poor final Premier League position could make retaining the services of high-profile stars difficult, though, as well as his exhortation to NESV to set about improving Roy Hodgson’s squad as quickly as possible, indicates his belief that Liverpool cannot afford to waste time as they look to regain ground lost over the past year.
“We have to finish this season in a better position than we are at the moment [ninth] and make sure we build for the next years,” Reina said.
“If not, it’s going to be difficult for them [the club] to keep these kinds of players.
“We are not as strong as Manchester City, Arsenal, Manchester United, Chelsea and Tottenham can be so that’s why we have to make sure we build a better squad.
“At the moment, it’s almost impossible to compete for nine months against Chelsea, for example, and that is what I want.”
Harry Redknapp has revealed that former Spurs director of football Damien Comolli has poached his most popular scout for Liverpool.
Ahead of Liverpool’s visit to Tottenham, on Sunday, Redknapp admitted his disappointment at losing French-based scout Steve Hitchen to the Anfield staff.
“Damien knows the French scene especially, and he’s got a big scouting network,” said the Tottenham manager. “In fact, we have just lost our French scout, who is excellent.
“He’s just gone to Liverpool, so he’s nicked him off us a bit lively. It’s a boy called Steve Hitchen and he was really good, an English boy who lived in France.
“He’s gone to Liverpool. But he was very, very good and we liked him a lot. He would have been our main scout abroad.”