Roy Hodgson signed Paul Konchesky for Liverpool in the summer of 2010, but he wasn’t his only former player he tried to recruit from Fulham
Roy Hodgson’s short reign as Liverpool manager is not looked on fondly. The former Crystal Palace boss replaced Rafa Benitez in the Anfield dugout in the summer of 2010, only to be dismissed by new owners FSG in July 2011 following a dismal stint on Merseyside which saw him oversee just 13 victories from 31 games in charge.
His transfer record with the club is one Kopites would prefer to forget also, having signed flops Milan Jovanovic, Joe Cole, Christian Poulsen, Danny Wilson, and Paul Konchesky. The latter followed Hodgson to Anfield from Fulham on summer transfer deadline day, as part of an infamous deal which saw the then Liverpool boss accidentally sell the wrong player as one of two youth players who left the club in exchange.
Yet Konchesky wasn’t the only player Hodgson tried to sign from Fulham after taking over as Reds manager. With Fernando Torres struggling with injury and his future the subject of scrutiny, leading to an eventual £50m transfer to Chelsea in January 2011, the former Liverpool manager also tried to sign Bobby Zamora from his former club.
The Reds even went as far as bidding for him, according to the striker, only to end up signing a new contract at Craven Cottage after Hodgson’s successor, Mark Hughes, told him he wanted him to stay at Fulham.
“We had Mark Hughes at Fulham at the time,” the former England international revealed when speaking on the Say it and Spray It Podcast. “I enjoyed my time with Mark, he came at the start of the season, I had a good pre-season with him.
“Roy (Hodgson) came in for me at Liverpool and Harry Redknapp came in for me at Spurs, but Mark said he wanted me to stay, and I’d just had my twins in August.
“The end of the transfer window was coming and they both bid, I ended up signing a new contract and broke my leg the next day.”
Zamora had admittedly enjoyed a successful season during Hodgson’s final year at Fulham, scoring 19 goals in all competitions as the Cottagers reached the Europa League final. Meanwhile, he’d return an impressive seven goals from 16 appearances during the 2010/11 season following his recovery from the aforementioned broken leg.
However, only once scoring more than 10 Premier League goals in a season, he never scored more than seven goals in all competitions in a campaign in the years that followed Liverpool’s unsuccessful bid. Aged 29 at the time of the Reds’ failed move, Zamora retired from football six years later in December 2016.
In contrast, Hodgson’s successor, Sir Kenny Dalglish, signed both Luis Suarez and Andy Carroll as part of a memorable £57.8m deadline day swoop the following January following Torres’ exit to Chelsea.
While Carroll would ultimately flop, Suarez proved to be one of their best pieces of business in the Premier League era, scoring 82 goals from 133 games before leaving for Barcelona in a £65m deal in the summer of 2014.
A version of this piece was first published in 2023
