Gator/fellow Liverpool fans:
Thoughts on rest of season for Liverpool?
Right now the team is playing great. Sturridge is bringing a new dimension, Sterling seems to be learning the striker position quite well, and Coutinho is playing out of his mind.
I don't know whether guys on Liverpool message boards are always so over-the-top, but it seems that they are all of the consensus that this is a do-or-die season, in terms of getting to the CL, as we can't afford to fall behind Arsenal in revenue another 50M dollars.
I'm still learning the game and the financial aspects, but this team is one of the top ten in the world in revenue and is full of youth. I'd say the future is extremely bright.
Well, many questions, and somewhat complex ones, which opens things up for opinions and interpretations.
Liverpool (and I suspect most teams') message boards are nuts. Most are poorly moderated, or just run over by twelve year olds. You have to pick and choose your battles with those, they can be excellent, but also very frustrating. 0.1% of RAWK is worth reading, if that, but the insight you can gain from reading it is excellent. I find that I don't have the time or patience to keep that up though.
In my opinion, it's not a do or die situation, as I don't think those exist, except for very special circumstances. Our former owners were like that, and they nearly brought the club to the brink of ruin. Many of the fans have lived through that mismanagement, and are itching to get back to former glory. Also 26 years of not lifting the trophy is a very very long time, especially watching those teams up the M62 lifting it 15 times in the process. Sure, there's been Champions League, FA Cup and League Cup titles sprinkled in, but that isn't enough.
I feel FSG has done an excellent job turning our financial struggles around, and their methodology/strategy has been very successful so far (kind of a bastardized moneyball concept), but while all (most) acknowledge that the youth movement and level of play from it has been phenomenal, they are impatient and want the big splashes in the transfer market which the richer clubs can do. Most are not used to Liverpool being in 10th place in the money league, or any league. Only 1st place is good enough, and some fans don't feel the club is taking strides to get there fast enough.
I think it's a case of the club overperforming last year, and people's expectation were raised sky high, while the long term plan from management and the manager, was to finish top 4, get CL football, and repeat that again this year (this has been documented in multiple interviews). The idea is that next season, we will have a team that can push for the title. I don't know if we are quite there yet, but there are very promising signs that we are well on our way. We have a young manager though, and he is still learning, and learning well, but he has had a lot of struggles figuring out how to man manage for a large number of games, setting up the right formations for the squad he has available, and how to find time to tactically prepare for a condensed schedule. A lot of people just see Shanks and Paisley, and anything less isn't good enough. I feel BR will be a very good manager for us when it's all said and done.
From a financial perspective, CL footy next year comes with a big boost in revenue from TV deal, to the tune of an extra 30M I believe. If looking historically during the premier league era, the biggest spenders on wages are the clubs finishing the highest. There is a direct correlation between wage spend and points in the league (exceptions exist of course), and we want to win, hence we need to close the gap financially with the richer clubs. Getting the stadium expansion finalized (10 years, at least, delayed), new sponsors, but also TV revenue from PL and CL will help a ton in doing it. We don't have an oil baron with unlimited resources available, so we have to close the gap by doing well on the pitch, earning extra revenue and planning for the long term. I think we are 10+ years away from breaking into the top 5, and that is if everything goes great along the way.
:( 
Sadly it's a top 3 financially right now, with two oil rich clubs, and the brand of Man U. Liverpool, Tottenham, Arsenal has catching up to do to consistently compete.
