Thirty years after Liverpool shattered the British transfer record to sign Stan Collymore, history appears to be repeating itself with another landmark acquisition. Collymore, a brilliant and brutally effective centre-forward, was unplayable on his day but endured a fraught start at Anfield, feeling isolated in the dressing room and tactically mismatched with the team’s pass-and-move philosophy.
Just six games into his Liverpool career, he famously questioned the club’s strategy. “I don’t know of any other industry,” he told a magazine, “that would lay out £8.5m on anything and then not have some plan from day one on how they’re going to use it.” By the time the interview was published, his goal drought had worsened, and he found himself behind Ian Rush and Robbie Fowler in the pecking order.
Now, Alexander Isak is facing an even more challenging introduction to life at Liverpool. Since his acrimonious, record-breaking £125m deadline-day transfer from Newcastle United, the striker’s only goal has come in a Carabao Cup tie. His first four league starts have all ended in defeat—a first for a Liverpool player since 1906. During the dismal 3-0 loss to Nottingham Forest, he was substituted after touching the ball just 15 times.
As Liverpool’s Premier League title defence crumbles with six defeats in seven matches, manager Arne Slot faces a multitude of problems, with the form of his star striker high on the list. The key question is whether Isak’s struggles are a short-term issue of match fitness, stemming from a forfeited pre-season used to force his exit from Newcastle, or if they signal a deeper incompatibility.
Collymore eventually adapted his game to create space for his strike partner Fowler, but his disillusionment grew, and he was sold to Aston Villa after two seasons. His legacy on Merseyside is overshadowed by his prescient critique of the transfer market, where clubs often spend lavishly on players without a clear plan for their integration.
The Isak deal was not supposed to fall into this category. Liverpool’s highly-regarded recruitment team, led by Michael Edwards and Richard Hughes, had identified him long before as the centrepiece of a rebuild designed to elevate a title-winning squad. Data and observation suggested the 26-year-old was a perfect fit to enhance a successful side.
Instead, Isak arrived unfit to a team in flux. His refusal to train at Newcastle, citing “broken promises,” has proven detrimental to all parties: his former club, the Sweden national team, Liverpool, and himself.
Slot has spoken of the difficult balance between building Isak’s fitness and selecting the best team. “A 100 per cent fit Alexander Isak is a big, big plus,” the manager said. “But for him to get there, he might need to have minutes where you could argue that another player might be further ahead.”
That other player, Hugo Ekitike, made a superb start to his own Liverpool career, scoring five goals in his first eight games and raising questions about whether Isak was even necessary. The tragedy of Diogo Jota’s death compelled the club to sign two No. 9s, but integrating Isak has disrupted Ekitike’s momentum, who now has just one goal in his last nine appearances.
Starting Isak against Forest seemed questionable, given he had played just 29 minutes since a hamstring injury in October, and the decision looked worse in hindsight. While he made intelligent runs, the connections with teammates were consistently off. In one instance, he dropped deep and spun forward for a through ball, a move perfected at Newcastle, but Mohamed Salah overhit the pass. In another, he created a dangerous chance from the wing, but the final ball never found him in a prime goalscoring position.
At times, he was simply outmuscled by Forest’s excellent central defenders, Nikola Milenkovic and Murillo. At others, he failed to get into the penalty area when crosses arrived, prompting visible frustration from Virgil van Dijk and Dominik Szoboszlai. His one clear opportunity, a difficult volley in the 64th minute, was scuffed—a sign of a player lacking both sharpness and confidence. His substitution five minutes later felt merciful, and Ekitike will now expect to start against PSV in the Champions League.
While Isak’s contract runs until 2031, providing ample time for him to succeed, his failure to make an immediate impact has created intense pressure and scrutiny. Right now, Liverpool cannot afford to carry passengers. Though the expectation remains that he will eventually click, his first few months as the Premier League’s most expensive player could hardly have gone worse.
Even in an era of sophisticated data analysis, Collymore’s experience serves as a reminder that huge transfers are fraught with intangible risks. It is still early, but the Isak deal is threatening to become a modern cautionary tale.
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