Liverpool owners Fenway Sports Group sounding out experienced Dutchman Louis van Gaal for senior role
Liverpool have made the first steps towards appointing Louis van Gaal as sporting director after meeting with him in Portugal last week.
There are, though, complications about the compatibility of the Dutchman’s methods with the way Fenway Sports Group is seeking to restructure the club.
Van Gaal has been spending the summer at his house in the Pine Cliffs resort near Albufeira in the Algarve and it is understood that Ian Ayre, the
Liverpool managing director, flew out to meet him last week.
There are very few available candidates that possess Van Gaal’s pedigree.
He has been out of work since falling into dispute with Ajax, where he was supposed to be made the new chief executive earlier this season before Johan Cruyff interceded to block the appointment.
While Van Gaal wants to be a head coach or manager, and has had plenty of offers in those positions, he recognises that Liverpool is a unique opportunity for him, even if it means working in a different role.
He has won titles in the Netherlands, Spain and Germany with Ajax, Barcelona and Bayern Munich and wants to test himself in English football.
The difficulties lie in Van Gaal being able to adapt to how Liverpool want their new management structure to work.
The first issue will be how comfortable the new manager would be working with such a powerful and ambitious figure at the same club, especially if it is a young manager like Roberto Martinez.
The
Wigan Athletic manager is leading the race to be appointed as Kenny Dalglish’s replacement, having met with John W. Henry, the principal owner, in Miami last week. One of the issues discussed will have been that of the sporting director.
Such is FSG’s admiration for Martinez that, after sacking Damien Comolli in April, they considered approaching him for the role of director of football.
At Wigan he has had a lot of control about the way the club works, including the academy and recruitment, and he will be reluctant to cede too much influence to a sporting director at Liverpool.
Van Gaal has a reputation for setting the highest standards and being forthright to the point of arrogance.
When he was technical director of Ajax in 2004, his demands caused him to fall out with head coach Ronald Koeman. Van Gaal ended up resigning.
Another problem that would need smoothing over is that, in all his previous jobs, Van Gaal has taken a substantial staff with him, made up of coaches and analysts.
It is understood that he would want to bring key people with him to Anfield to help infuse the club with his football philosophy.
Andries Jonker, his former assistant at Bayern, has announced that he will be leaving Munich this summer, giving rise to speculation that he will be joining up with Van Gaal again.
Van Gaal would also want to bring Frans Hoek with him, the innovative goalkeeping coach who Pepe Reina credits with developing his distinctive style at Barcelona.
Liverpool, though, have apparently refused to accept Steve Clarke’s resignation as first team coach and only appointed Kevin Keen as a coach last summer and may seek some continuity in this area.
Then, of course, any new manager is going to want to bring some trusted coaching staff with him.
To add to this complicated picture, FSG are also contemplating appointing a technical director as well as a sporting director.
They felt that Comolli was taking on too much as director of football and went to divide the responsibilities into two jobs.
Pep Segura, the technical manager of the Liverpool academy, is the favourite for the technical director role, although this division could be another source of potential conflict, especially if Van Gaal feels it dilutes his role.
The next step for the owners is to decide, after this initial sounding out, whether to meet with Van Gaal personally and find a way to resolve the issues that his appointment would bring, or whether to look for a candidate who, while not having Van Gaal’s track record, would prove a more straightforward fit for the way they want to run the club.
