Fee Agreed for José Enrique

By: Ed | August 11th, 2011

enrique

Liverpool FC confirmed today that they had agreed a fee with Newcastle United for the transfer of José Enrique.

The club have now been given permission to discuss personal terms with the player, who will travel to Liverpool to undergo a medical.

With just under three weeks left in the summer transfer window, Liverpool finally get a left back, with a fee reported to be in the region of £5.5m. If accurate that’s an absolute bargain, particularly considering the discussions earlier in the summer about the cost of signing up the Newcastle man.

There’s been a need for Liverpool to add personnel at the back since at least last summer; even with the change in ownership, it’s become clear that Emiliano Insua sn’t going to last long, and the frailties of Fabio Aurelio made for a challenging season on the left side of defense. Glen Johnson showed adaptability and turned in some admirable performances while deputizing, and, countering John Flanagan, Jack Robinson emerged as one of the bright spots of last season’s run-in.

Neither Johnson nor Robinson were lasting solutions, though, and with Aurelio’s fitness a temporary boost at most, adding someone to the mix was a basic necessity. There’s probably those who would have preferred that the club had made this their marquee signing of the summer and spend a few million more a month or so ago, but, if the reports about the fee are true, it looks like signing Enrique (or anyone else) then would have been wasteful.

As far as transfer sagas go, this one was relatively tame—Alan Pardew got a bit upset when Enrique used his Twitter account to criticize the club’s transfer dealings, and ending up having to consult Alex Ferguson, leading technology liaison for the Premier League. It was a bit of an ongoing problem with Enrique, who had tweeted his match availability earlier in the season, but ultimately proved to be another overblown story, and one that you can’t imagine taking place at Kenny Dalglish’s Liverpool.

The 25-year-old earned plenty of attention during the 2010-2011 season, with a reputation for getting forward with excellent pace while losing little of his effectiveness in defense. In the last few days Jen Chang from Sports Illustrated discussed the latter statistic from the season gone by; assuming the tracking for this type of stat is valid, and the amount of times he was taken on is comparable to the other names included, it’s mighty impressive—to only be beaten nine times over 36 appearances is stunning, and a facet of his game that may have otherwise gone unheralded given his skill in attack.

He also provides a nice juxtaposition in terms of reliability; as noted above, he led Newcastle in appearances last season and has been a consistent performer for the club since arriving in 2007. That’s a far cry anything Liverpool’s had since the glory days of John Arne Riise, with, at the very least, Alvaro Arbeloa, Fabio Aurelio, Daniel Agger, Emiliano Insua, Glen Johnson, Danny Wilson, and Jack Robinson playing a part at some point over the past three seasons.

The hope is still that Aurelio stays fit and can fit into the eleven on a consistent basis, but adding Enrique to the mix allows for a natural left back to feature nearly every time out. And either way, Liverpool have the potential to terrorize teams down the left flank—we saw the potential of Aurelio and Downing at the weekend against Valencia, with overlap and interplay that was terrifically effective at times. Substituting Enrique to that partnership would certainly have its benefits, as he’s pacier than Aurelio and more forward-minded, and more than willing to work his way up the pitch.

In the end, and as I mentioned yesterday when talk increased, it’s a positive, shrewd signing for the club, and one that will only make them better. So, like always, we wish José Enrique the best as he begins his Liverpool career. Oh, and an awkwardly-soundtracked video compilation. That’s mandatory:

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Category: Miscellaneous, Team News, Transfer News

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Danny

Glad for Reina, hes gonna have another Spaniard about the place, in his defense too. Gotta be a bonus for him, he was going to have to "enjoy" working with Clichy at one point. bhrr......
Dirk Kuyt Industries

So we now have arguably the fastest and best isolation defending LB in the PL linking up with arguably the best crosser in the PL firing in to arguably the best header in the PL, supported by arguably the top form striker in the PL (and, really, the world) and arguably the hardest working forward in the PL, playing up top of arguably the PL's best keeper and holding mid.

This year's gonna be fun.
CAPoet

This just made me smile! :D
Geza

To be honest I was not too impressed by him when I watched the two games he played against us, but according to well informed sources (work-mates that are NCL Utd season ticket holders for years...and pretty depressed nowadays...), he is trully solid and exciting player.

I think that the next priority is to seriously start getting rid of all the deadwood (Poulsen, Cole, Deggen, El Zahar, Jones) and to a lesser extent, of all the prospects that did not quite make it (Insua, Ayala, etc.). There is only about 3 weeks left and so much to be done... I am pretty convinced that NESV made this the next key priority, considering all the money that is wasted each week (i'd say easily £0.3-0.4MM).
Gryffin

Join up on Oh You Beauty's Fantasy League - http://fantasy.premierleague.c... - Private Leaguge - 302898-189271
Carol Gilmore

The only thing guaranteed that Jose Enrique will get with Liverpool is his house robbed.
Seanster

Now thats top humour. Your a live one Carol, keep em coming.
Ed

Topical!
Gryffin

glad some arsenal fan is reading L'pool.offside
ChrisLFC

Was hoping these rumors were true....good signing for our club! Another CB signing would be nice, but this will work out just fine I think. Looking forward to Saturday more and more. Hoping to see #7 on the pitch, if only for a half!
mardia

Glad that our LB situation is now sorted out, and we have depth at both LB and RB now. If/When Aurelio's body breaks down (it's totally a matter of when, though) I'm glad we won't have to depend solely on throwing Robinson into the deep end.

If we can just get a CB, I'll be totally satisfied with our transfer season. Speaking of, can anybody tell me out of Cahill or Dann, which one LFC should be going for more? I've heard differing accounts on both, and now I'm totally confused as to who is overrated/underrated/a bargain/quality/blah blah blah, seeing as I haven't watched either.
Ravenilli

If he is as good on the ball as that video makes him out to be then he will be a great attacking force along with Downing. Never really paid too much attention to him playing at Newcastle as my ABU ism tends to cover every United. If the fee is correct then he would be a great signing and if the stats are correct he's a brilliant signing.
Ed

And ignoring the pepperoni nipples, he looks fairly excited to be at Melwood:

http://www.liverpoolfc.tv/news...
Justin

I was TOTALLY about to post about how awesome I thought his nipples were! Damn. Beat me to it.
Guest

Heretics! The whole lot of you are heretics! Everyone knows that Riise had the best nipples ever for a Liverpool left back.

Right, so, uh...lets talk some football! This looks like a good signing.
justin

been a long time but i'm genuinely excited about the kind of progress we might make down the left now!
Thomas Hoppe

Good News. Don't like the news that Arsenal are negotiating for Dann. I am still holding hope that he will come to Liverpool, but it may be hard for him to turn down Arsenal and Champions League football.
Justin

He's a local lad though, and I'm pretty sure he's already openly stated his desire to come play for us. I think this will be another Connor Wickham situation: Liverpool will stand firm on the offer they think is right, and if Arsenal tops that, then its up to Birmingham and Dann to decide.
CheekyFellow

I really wish Kelly got more runs at centerback with Agger during preseason, but if Johnson is injured, I guess he'll be going straight to RB.
poorscouserbobby

I have noticed he has Kuyt-like endurance. Just doesn't stop running. Which would be excellent, for the Left side. This summer is shaping into a pretty good one!
Justin

Woooooooo! I'm excited about this one, and THE PRICE?! Wow, here I was thinking Michael Ashley was going to try to lead us down the prim-rose path before slapping another $20M on Enrique's buyout clause.

I have to second Not too Xabi's notion below: we get another 1-2 CBs and we've got something to look forward to this year ;)
Indian

i always wanted fabio coentrao but this guy is awesome!
CheekyFellow

This is the poor-man's Fabio Coentrao -- works for me.
NotTooXabi

Johnson/Kelly. Enrique/Auerlio. (Flanman and Robbo under the proverbial wings.) Dear me, is that depth and quality on the flanks? I'm not sure what to do with myself. (Shuffling amateur scouting reports and line-up charts....) GOT IT!

Carra's old. Agger's brittle. Skrtel's raw (still?). We still need another CB?!?

Whew...almost ran out of reasons to read the Morning Mongerings.

All is well.
Tom Foolery

I liked this comment, more out of the awesomeness of the commenters name than the actual comment.

Quality stuff
redtrev73

A) Joint top prize to you (with the excellently monikered Dirk Kuyt Industries) for the name!! Love it.

B) Agree re. lingering angst about needing a new centre half but I feel Kelly and Wilson can step up there if needed. Danny was excellent for Scotland last nite.

C) What is going on with the whole strength-in-depth thing?? It's bloody fantastic but...it makes me uneasy! If we do get that new centre-half and some cover up-top (presuming Ngog moves on), well...there can be no excuses for underachievement. So, like I said, UNEASY!!

D) Hats off to Kenny Dalglish for the absolute sea-change he's brought about at LFC in conjunction with FSG. Feels like my club again and I feel prouder than ever to be a Redman right now.