There’s no point pretending that Wataru Endō was an especially inspiring signing when he arrived at Liverpool from German club Stuttgart in August.
Yes, this was the captain of the Japan national team, but Liverpool was also buying a 30-year-old with little pedigree at club level, and indeed little recognition outside the Bundesliga. The relatively low $21m (£16m/€19m) fee appeared to be an indication of his standing within the game.
Endō wasn’t helped by the timing of his move, joining as the Reds tried to pick up the pieces after a $135m (£110/€127m) deal for Moisés Caicedo collapsed when the player refused to travel for a medical and expressed a preference to join Chelsea instead. On this basis, Jürgen Klopp knew that many would be unimpressed.
I know how football fans are, they would prefer to bring in a player who is £110m,” he said (via the ECHO).
But the Liverpool boss then passionately urged the Anfield faithful to give Endō a chance, listing off the player’s credentials and backing him to silence his doubters on the field.
“He is obviously a top fit and we will have a lot of fun with him. I’m really sure he can help us immediately, which is super-cool because the season already started. So, he will show how good he is on the pitch and I can’t wait to have him around.”
Reading these comments back on a couple of months on, the great irony, of course, is that Klopp hasn’t really given Endō a chance himself. Yes, he’s started all three games in the cup competitions (two in the Europa League and one in the Carabao Cup), but he’s only started one of the seven Premier League games Liverpool has played since he arrived, and he’s twice been an unused substitute.
Why might this be the case? Well, Klopp threw Endō in at the first real opportunity away to Newcastle — he’d only had one training session before his debut against Bournemouth — and it’s possible that he saw something in that game that prompted him to rethink his timeline. Maybe he needs more education in Klopp’s philosophy before he can start the most difficult matches, and that’s why he’s only played 22 top-flight minutes since the trip to St James’ Park.
The more cynical reading is that Klopp wasn’t really as optimistic about Endō as he let on, and that he was only ever going to be a squad player, hence the comparison to James Milner (via This is Anfield). Perhaps the German was simply looking to regain control of the narrative after the embarrassment surrounding Caicedo.
Still, though, this was his signing — Klopp said Endō had always been on his list, but he’d only now been able to break away from the club’s customary transfer policy to sign him — and so it remains a surprise that he’s featured very little.
The good news is that he now has an ideal opportunity to change this because, as we covered on Tuesday, Liverpool has four South American players kicking off in the early hours of Wednesday morning, with current first-choice number six Alexis Mac Allister among them.
The Reds are due to face Everton in the early kick-off on Saturday 21, and the last time Klopp tried to throw Mac Allister into the line-up in a very similar set of circumstances against Wolves, it ended in a half-time substitution and a 1-0 deficit.
There’s a strong chance, then, that the Argentine is benched for the derby, particularly after struggling against Brighton. That could in turn open the door for Endō to start, demonstrate his worth, and earn the kind of opportunities we thought would come
