Former Liverpool midfielder admits he was ‘horrendous’ during his first year at Anfield

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Liverpool have seen this season how good it can be when new signings hit the ground running at Anfield.

The Reds are said to have been delighted with their summer business in 2023, and you can see why. From Alexis Mac Allister to Wataru Endo, Jurgen Klopp’s new boys have done brilliantly.

However, it doesn’t always go so smoothly. Although we think he’s largely been excellent, Dominik Szoboszlai has recently been labelled as a bad buy.

Whether you agree with that or not, it’s hard to argue when a player themselves comes out and says it. And that’s exactly what former Reds midfielder Peter Beardsley has done today.

Who is Peter Beardsley

For the older generation of Liverpool fans, we’re so sorry. But plenty of younger supporters will have little to no idea who Peter Beardsley is.

If that’s you, then let us enlighten you. Having been superb for Newcastle United in the mid 1980’s, Beardsley was signed by then Liverpool player-manager Kenny Dalglish. Joining alongside John Barnes, he formed a new-look front line as a kind of attacking midfielder.

As a silky and skilful player, Beardsley was the type to get supporters on their feet. With Barnes, John Aldridge and later Ian Rush in the squad too, Liverpool had so many ways to hurt opponents.

Staying for four years at Anfield, Beardsley collected two league title and an FA Cup, scoring 61 goals in 175 games.

What has he said

Although Liverpool actually ended up winning the league in his debut season in 1987/88, Beardsley admitted on The Rest Is Football podcast that he was ‘horrendous’ that year.

“At Liverpool initially, for the first year, I was horrendous. I’m not embarrassed to say it.” Beardsley told Alan Shearer, Gary Lineker and Micah Richards.

“They paid almost £2 million for me but we won the league and that was Barnsey mainly. But by Christmas I’d only scored three goals, in the end I ended up with 19 or something like that, but before that I was really struggling.

“Kenny [Dalglish] was so loyal to me. When I first went there he told me I was going to wear the number seven shirt and without being cocky about it, that was the big shirt at Liverpool in those days.

“So Kenny told me I was going to take his place and wear his shirt. For me to wear that and the loyalty that Kenny showed me, so certainly before Christmas and probably until March I was really poor. But then I scored the winning goal against Tottenham to win us the league. That’s how football works!”

What a team Liverpool had back in those days, and what an interesting little anecdote from Beardsley!