Liverpool owner John W Henry has admitted that Kop idol Steven Gerrard could have been sold in the summer if he had taken over the club sooner.
Henry and Anfield’s new chairman, Tom Werner, are committed to following the strategy which has underpinned their success at baseball club the Boston Red Sox.
That involves selling players who reach the 30-year-old mark and whose resale value is diminishing, in favour of bringing in younger players who have yet to reach their potential.
That would even have left Anfield talisman Gerrard, 30, vulnerable if Henry and Werner’s New England Sports Ventures (NESV) had been in situ during the summer. Another local hero, Jamie Carragher, would have struggled to have earned the lucrative new two-year deal he has just signed at the age of 32.
An NESV insider revealed: “You always have to plan for the future and if that means moving on big players, providing the transfer fee is right, then so be it.”
Liverpool under Henry and Werner would have seriously considered any substantial summer bids for England star Gerrard.
Henry was thankful that Gerrard is still around after watching him hit a 14-minute hat-trick in Thursday’s 3-1 Europa League win over Napoli.
In July 2009 Gerrard signed a new four-year contract worth £140,000 a week which keeps him at Liverpool until 2013.
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