Henry Wants Squad Depth

Liverpool owner John W Henry has pinpointed the squad's lack of strength in depth and emerging stars as one of the club's main problems.

The Reds are considered one of the Premier League's giants, but they have gone 20 years since their last title success and have struggled in recent campaigns.

Liverpool have found themselves lagging behind the likes of Manchester United, Chelsea and Arsenal not only in terms of success on the pitch but revenue streams off it.

However, Henry has a long-term vision for the Reds and sees strengthening in Roy Hodgson's squad as one of the main priorities.

Liverpool appointed Spurs' former director of football Damien Comolli this week to help and he believes the Frenchman will help the team achieve their goal.

"We're not deep enough. We don't have enough youth," he told Sky Sports News.

"If you look at Manchester United and Arsenal they have depth.

"They have relative young teams and that's something that he (Comolli) can help us with."

Some believe the addition of Comolli could undermine Hodgson's authority, however, Henry insists the ex-Fulham boss wanted the position filling.

When asked if Comolli's arrival would undermine Hodgson, Henry replied: "No, not at all.

"When I first met with Roy it was really clear that he wanted someone in that position, so I really didn't talk that much with Roy over the week or so before we made the decision to bring Damien in.

"So I think he may have been surprised when I brought it up, but he's fully supportive. He knows Damien. I think the model really requires people of certain personalities for it to work and Roy and Damien are two personalities that will mesh well together.

"It will be a group decision. You build consensus. I think it's a very good model, but though each will be in charge of their own areas.

"We're still building a team. We're in the middle of building that. We may make some mistakes early on, but we're going to try and avoid that and we're studying every day."

Former owners Tim Hicks and George Gillett ran Liverpool into spiralling debts and Henry insists the new American regime will not fall into the same traps.

Henry also owns Major League Baseball team the Boston Red Sox and helped bring success to the famous club and acknowledges investment is needed at Anfield.

The 61-year-old knows that a new stadium is preferable in the long run as opposed to refurbishing Anfield if they are to compete with the Premier League's leading clubs in terms of revenue with Fifa's Fair Play rules set to come into force.

"We really have to invest in the club. We need more depth. We need to build the squad," he continued.

"We need stadium changes, whether we build a new ground in Stanley Park or we rebuild and refurbish Anfield. If you build a stadium there's debt involved in that. Even Arsenal had to borrow to build Emirates. You cannot sustain a club in the long term to buy players.

"You're really limited to what your revenues are. That means we have to create revenues worldwide. We have to generate revenues and that's what we're really good at.

"When we went to Boston we spent three years trying to figure out whether to build a new stadium or refurbish the new one.

"We need to move faster. Hopefully within a year, but I don't want to set a hard-fast timeline when we'll make that decision. If you're going to build a new ground that takes time."