The transfer window officially opened today and as expected, there is a lot of transfer talk already through out the whole league. As always, there will be stories just being made up to unsettle teams and players, whilst some stories will just be made up to sell the papers.

It is no secret that we need some additions to our squad this January but we also know that Rafa does not have a lot of money, if any, to spend on new players so he has to sell first before he can buy.

But this morning, reports or appearing from quite a lot of sources that Liverpool are on the verge, or have already completed a deal which will bring the Argentine Maxi Rodriguez from Atletico Madrid to Liverpool on loan until the end of the season.

We have been linked with Rodriguez in the past, notably during the 2008 summer window. Now when I first heard about this deal I was a bit surprised and thought that it was just another rumour but this deal does make some sense:
We would not have to pay a transfer fee for Rodriguez which bodes well for us as we do not have the cash to buy him outright. Secondly, Rodriguez is out of favour in Madrid and needs some regular first team football so that he can push for a place in the Argentina world cup squad. Thirdly, Rafa is an admirer of Maxi and the player is close friends with Torres and Mascherano so I can not see the player not wanting to come to Liverpool. Fourthly, we need a player of Maxi’s quality out wide. He would be perfect coming in on the right flank in place of Dirk. Once we have the lead and need to protect it, then maybe we could take Maxi off and replace him with the hard working Dirk to close out the game.

What do you think of the potential arrival of Maxi Rodriguez to Liverpool?

Liverpool have decided to splash 1.5 million pounds on Greek center back, Sotirios Kyrgiakos. Now I do not know much about this guy besides the fact that he played for Rangers and he is a Greek international. Kyrgiakos is 30 which means he has experience and that is just what we need as we currently have a centre back crisis. I see Kyrgiakos just coming in to fill the role Sami did i.e. play when need be and give some pointers to the young up and coming centre backs.

I am sure Kyrgiakos understands why he is being signed. He should not expect to the first name on Rafa’s team sheet but who knows, if the guy proves to be a hit them he will start. Kyrgiakos is arriving from AEK Athens and there was a lot of speculation about this deal earlier in the week but now the Official Liverpool Website has confirmed that we have agreed a deal to bring the Greek man to Anfield. I stand to be corrected but I think this is the first Greek player to play for Liverpool?

Kyrgiakos may not be the Shawcross or Turner we were after but I hope he is good enough to provide the cover when need be. If anyone knows anything more about Kyrgiakos please let us know or simply just let us know what you think about this signing.

You got to love Rafa! Only yesterday he confirmed that Alonso was leaving for Real Madrid and he has straight away lined up Roma’s Aquilani to replace Alonso. I am sure the Aquilani deal was in place some time ago and it is only being made public now. Rafa must have known that Alonso is going and he was only going to let Alonso leave once the Aquilani deal was tied up. Now that is how you work the transfer market. No wonder Rafa wanted full control of the transfers, he seems to know what is going on. I am so glad Rick Parry has left as we still would be trying to tie up the Aquilani deal at this stage.

The official Liverpool website tells us that we have agreed a fee with Roma for Aquilani and all that is left is for a medical to take place some time this week. I am sure it is going to be an intense medical as Aquilani has only just recovered from ankle surgery so we have to make sure he is fit to play. There is no indication on how much we are going to pay for him with some thinking its anything between £17 and £20 million. Either way we should still have change left over from the Alonso £30 million.

We should not expect Aquilani to come in a be the pass master that Alonso was. I do not think there are many players in the game today who can pass the ball as well as Alonso but Aquilani will offer us something a bit different in the middle of the field. What I like about Aquilani is that he has an eye for goal and hopefully he will chip in with a few more goals than Alonso did.

I recall when we signed Dossena last summer and I said that he could become a great player for us as Italy is well known for producing find left backs, but then I ate humble pie as he did not live up to my expectations. So I am not going to gamble and say that Italy have produced great midfielders therefore Aquilani is going to be a star for us. But deep down I really hope he does well.

The longest running transfer saga of the summer is finally over. Liverpool have agreed a fee, thought to be in the region of £30million with Real Madrid for Xabi Alonso. I am saddened today as we have lost a great player but bigger players have left Liverpool in the past so we should be okay. The moment Alonso decided he wanted to join Real Madrid, I knew that it was only a matter of time before he left.

What I am really impressed with with regards to this transfer is that Rafa seems to have stuck by his guns and did not back down or get bullied by Real Madrid. It seems Rafa was stuck on not letting Alonso go for less than his asking price of £30million. I can only imagine if Rick Parry was still at Liverpool and was tasked with handling this transfer, it would have been resolved a very long time ago but we probably would have only gotten £15million!

Now all that is left is for Alonso to have a medical in Madrid on Wednesday as he has not flown out with the rest of the team tonight to Norway. I am pretty sure the medical will go smoothly. We now have to wait and see who Rafa is going to buy to replace Alonso. With a possible £30million kitty, Rafa could get Roma’s Alberto Aquilani for £20million and still have £10million left over to strengthen in other areas. The next couple of days are going to be crucial as we need to sign someone rather soon as the season is about to kickoff.

I never wanted Xabi to leave but the moment he declared he he wants to join Real Madrid you could sense his heart was no longer with us and in cases like that, it is always best for the player to leave. We want players who want to where the Red shirt and not have their minds on other teams. But thank you for the good times Xabi. My letter to you will follow shortly.

I was going through the news this morning and I came across an article which suggested that Rafa may be ready to bid for David Villa using the money we plan to get from the sale of Alonso to Real Madrid. Now when I first heard this I laughed it off but then I sat down and really thought about it. If this is true, this could just be what we need to complete our Championship winning team.

Signing David Villa would be one of the biggest signings in the clubs history and I am sure he will cost much more than we paid for Torres thus making him the most expensive player in the clubs history. There is no doubting the quality of Villa and if he were to form a partnership with Torres upfront, we will no doubt have the best strike partnership in the world at our disposal.

My first worry would be, what would happen to Stevie G? Stevie and Torres formed a great partnership but it would have to mean that Stevie would drop back into central midfield to fill the hole left by Alonso thus allowing Torres and Villa to play upfront together. I am sure Stevie would not mind dropping back into midfield if its for the betterment of the team.

The prospect of signing Villa is mouth watering but I still believe this is one big rumour which is being spun around to sell papers and drive traffic to websites. I seem to recall Rafa being asked in the past if he has plans to sign David Villa and he said ‘No’. But I am sure if the opportunity arises, Rafa would snap Villa up in a second. I do not think it would be too hard to convince Villa to join Liverpool as Torres would convince him and to top it off, his favourite number 7 jersey would be waiting for him at Anfield.

Looks like we are going to have to replace two if not three key players this summer!

Alonso will now join the Madrid globetrotters who only need Ribery to magically appear now and they will have a full set of the galactico’s that Perez set out for when he became President. Rafa wanted £30m + for Alonso but now will only get around £27.5m ish if you believe the papers…….or is that the amount that we would have got anyway? Look at it this way, once Alonso handed in his written transfer request that removes his loyalty bonus from the transfer, this equates to around £1m. Also the transfer will presumably go through in August 2009, it is now over the five year period since he arrived at Liverpool and we will not have to pay Real Sociedad 10% of the selling on fee, Say £3m.

In total that’s £4m, meaning that by my accounts we are up £1.25m – shrewd business by Rafa, but we would all rather have Alonso on the team sheet!

But now the big question, who to replace Alonso? It is easier to replace a water carrier than a lock pick, that’s why they are a rare and expensive commodity. There will be fans out there that will say that we need to give Lucas a chance to prove his worth. There is no doubt that he has the ability, just look at his record at Brazil under 20’s and also for Gremio. Lucas even became the youngest player to ever to receive Placar magazine’s Bola de Ouro (Golden Ball), given to the best player in the Campeonato Brasileiro — an honour previously won by the likes of Zico, Falcão, Careca, Alex, Romario, Kaká and Tevez. But do we risk our season on this? Ron previously posted in a letter to Lucas to prove he is all that he can be and I think Rafa will maybe give him 20+ starts over all the games of the season.

If I was in Rafa’s shoes I would want to bring in someone and that person would be Christian Poulsen of Juventus and Denmark.

Poulsen signed on a Bosman last year from Seville and has had a terrible time in Italy and this summer has been linked with various mid premiership clubs, Fulham being in the public but could not match his wage demands. Poulsen is in the same Alonso mould and it was that same role that he played successfully for Seville during the Ramos era were they successfully won the UEFA cup back to back along with the Super cup and the Spanish version of the FA cup, so he has more than enough big game experience. Settling in won’t be a problem as Danish team mate Agger is already here and he speaks English competently. Juventus want to sell as they have just signed the Brazilian Melio for that role and if Fulham have bidded and it has been accepted as they discussed terms, then the fee must be in the region of £3m - £7m max, and wages wouldn’t be an issue as Alonso’s previous pay packet would cover that!

So what’s the catch I hear you say, discipline! – He has a reputation for losing his cool, see the link to his Wikipedia page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Poulsen . The last time he lost his cool he punched Swedish Striker Marcus Rosenberg in the Stomach!

So Poulsen for Alonso, who’s next to replace………..Sami Hyypia?

Sami left after 10 wonderful years at Liverpool, but so far this summer there has not been much talk about replacing him until today. If you believe them then Rafa is trying to bring in more English players, Mike Turner of Hull being one of them. Maybe a surprise target for some of you but personally he is Hulls version of a certain Jamie Carragher, and we would all love a team of Carragher’s!

Turner would make a solid squad addition to the team and under Carragher’s stewardship would make a fine centre half for many years to come. He is certainly in the mould of Carragher, loyal and committed having played for Hull at every level of the league and did not look out of place last year in the premiership – I feel that this would be a strong signing for Rafa as it would be in the region of £5-7m

And what of the one that hasn’t got away yet – Mascherano! Soon to be leaving on a Jet plan to Barcelona.

The press again today has linked us with Lee Cattermole of Wigan. Cattermole had a steady season last year and had a good under 21’s and his value has sky rocketed from the £3.5m that Steve Bruce paid for him to the figure of around £12m. But is he the English Mascherano and is he worth £12m? Maybe/Maybe not, but he is English and as we have found out with the purchase of Glen Johnson – English means add on a bit extra!

What does his game entail and what do we want him to do –
1. Reads the game,
2. Strong in the tackle,
3. Breaks up play and
4. Makes the simple pass, thus
5. Controlling possession, and
6. Protects the back four!

Ticks all those boxes then.

He does a job that never gets any attention and gets little reward of the glamour and fame.

Was the signing of Cattermole the making of Wigan last year a coincidence? Wigan finished comfortably in 14th, and before the January window were challenging for Europa league spot. Compare this to the previous season when they had to be rescued by Steve Bruce from relegation in January! I think that this is no coincidence and would be a solid replacement for Mascherano.

I think Rafa can work with these aggressive rough Diamond’s like he did with Mascherano as if you remember that time at Old Trafford, he did have a wee bit of a temper!

So with my reckoning, we should receive around the £50m mark for Alonso and Mascherano – not bad business when the two of them cost in the region of £29m (£10.25 for Alonso and approx £18m for Mascherano). And if we can get Cattermole, Poulsen and Turner for £25m who knows, Rafa could blow the other £25m on Ashley Young and that would solve the left sided lottery as well!

I had hoped that it would not go this far but reports this morning say that Xabi Alonso has handed in a written transfer request to Liverpool as he seeks to move to Real Madrid. This is it I guess! Rafa now has no choice but to sell Alonso as clearly the player does not want to play for us anymore. The question now is, “How much are we going to get for Alonso?”

We had wanted £30m for Alonso but Real have refused to pay that. So now that Alonso has handed in his request, the ball is firmly in Madrid’s court as whatever they offer us we may be forced to accept as we just have to get rid of Alonso. There is suggestion that Real have agreed to pay us £27.5m which I would take without thinking twice now.

Alonso himself had hoped that this saga would not go this far as he had hoped the two teams would agree on a fee without him having to publicly come out and hand in a transfer request. I personally do not know what to make of this. I did not want Alonso to go but the fact that he wants to leave makes me feel gutted. We are going to loose a great player but hopefully we can sign someone else similar to him with the cash we get. Let us not jump to conclusions just yet until this deal is signed, sealed and delivered.

The one transfer we were all pretty sure was going to take place finally happened today. Arbeloa has completed his move to Real Madrid after we agreed a fee with them and the player passed a medical. The moment we signed Glen Johnson, I knew that Arbeloa’s time was up as he would not be our regular first choice right back. It is understood that we sold Arbeloa for 3.5 million pounds which is a one million pound profit from when we bought him from Deportivo. I would have hoped we had gotten more for him but I guess we have to make do with it rather than loosing him for free at the end of next season when his contract was expiring.

Thank you for the service Alvaro, we wish you all the best in Madrid.

Reports today say that Xabi Alonso flew into Madrid last night as he seeks to complete his move to Real Madrid. It is said that Liverpool have given Madrid 48 hours to come up with the cash to complete the deal. “How much do we really want for Alonso?” no one seems to know. Madrid do not seem to want to pay much for Alonso. The Spanish giants’ president Florentino Perez said: ‘Some people obviously thought that because we said we wanted more Spanish players, they could ask for fees which don’t correspond to reality.’

It is funny how the price of English players in England is astronomical! Just look at how much we spent on Glen Johnson. So now Spanish teams do not want to break the bank for Spanish players? That does not make sense. Madrid should pay a high price for Alonso thus I agree with Rafa for sticking to his guns and saying he does not want anything less than £30million for Alonso.

But now that Alonso is in Spain, I will not be surprised if we hear any second now that he has completed his move to Real and they have accepted to give us the cash. Watch this space as we will keep you updated on the latest news with regards to Alonso. Hopefully in the next 48 hours we will know what is happening.

The last time Glen Johnson got a taste of exactly the kind of fanaticism that awaits travelling football players in Bangkok, he was wearing distinctly different colours. The blue of Chelsea, to be precise.

At Tuesday’s press conference in the ballroom of the Grand Erawan hotel, the Englishman was all smiles, all ready to answer questions, and as Rafa put it, all ready to play. And he looked just right in the red of Liverpool FC. “It’s been fantastic. Everybody’s been great to me, helped me settle in. It’s brilliant here in Bangkok, all those fans in the Liverpool shirts, it’s a great sight to see,” he said, and added a hope that he could come up with the kind of consistent display he had last season with Portsmouth.

Today was a busy day for the squad, with the division of duties all too evident to anyone who happened to be out on a cloudy day in the Thai capital. When I was returning home, a cavalcade of policemen on bikes furiously signalled for our car to stop so a string of minivans could pass by, and yes, they contained Liverpool FC”s finest, eager for a bit of sightseeing. A few went to the Grand Palace, while others were packed off to do their various promotional commitments and football clinics. They probably did squeeze in a few hours rest before the nearly two-hour long training session that was to take place at the Rajamangala Stadum in the evening, passes to which were very kindly handed out to me by Steve McMahon, who is very nice to talk to, even if you are tongue-tied and star-struck.

At the beginning of the evening’s practice, the players confined themselves to two small circles in the centre of the field, but the stadium had been taken over by roaring, screaming, flag-waving supporters who were well-versed in all the Liverpool anthems. ‘We all dream of a team of Carraghers’ was repeated again and again as the man himself knocked a few balls around, along with emphatic cries of ‘Xabi don’t go’, ‘Mascherano don’t leave for Barca’, and requests to Fernando Torres to convey the same message to his countrymate: ‘Tell Xabi no go to Real, tell Xabi to stay, Fernando!’

Torres, meanwhile, contented himself with running laps around the athletics track at the stadium, checking his watch every now and then, and was soon joined by Yossi Benayoun, Alvaro Arbeloa and Xabi Alonso. They deigned to raise their hands to the crowd now and then, every time bringing up a fresh wave of cheers. In the kickabout that followed, the following were moments worthy of some noise: Johnson’s excellent backheel flick of a pass in the middle, Pepe’s quick recovery for a save that was nearly a lost cause, Carra getting stuck into the opposition, and so what if it happened to be his own clubmate, he was on a different team for the moment.

Torres and Alonso went off early back to the locker room to thunderous applause, and it’s pretty certain that the Spanish contingent will play a role only in the end credits of Wednesday’s match. Johnson is likely to be in the first XI, and after less than impressive results in their last two friendlies, Liverpool will look to get in a win on their pre-season tour of Asia. But regardless of the result, their visit here will be referred to time and again amongst the hordes of fanatics who have been thronging the hotel and stadium the last two days for a glimpse of a world they only see on television between August and May each season. They lined the path inside and outside the stadium gates once it was time for the players to leave the stadium after their practice on Tuesday night, and waited excitedly in the hope of getting another chance to get close to their heroes. There was no sign of that happening anytime soon, but they were happy to bide time discussing all things Liverpool, and it’ll stay in their minds as a happy memory forever.

I know I’ll never forget it.