Andoni Iraola is in.
Is he as close as you can get to a sure thing? Nope. That chap is in Paris.
Does he have the track record of elite excellence, of lifting trophies? Not at all. Oliver Glasner remains out of work.
Is this a risk? Absolutely. It’s a big leap.
It’s exciting though. So exciting.
Pretty much the first thing I thought of when I saw Andoni Iraola back in 2023 was how much he reminded me of Seve Ballesteros. This isn’t so much about being a lookalike, though there is a similarity, but in terms of mannerism and demeanour.
I’m not a big golf guy but you couldn’t grow up in the 1980s and 90s and not have an awareness of Ballesteros, couldn’t not know his smile after some magic had happened, couldn’t not know he had taken a moribund sport and given it charisma and glamour. He was a shot-maker and risk-taker of a golfer, one who didn’t hold back, who couldn’t resist the big shot, showed constant sporting courage, going for the hole and having such warmth in his face when it worked and a shrug when it didn’t.
He saw adversity as something to devour, difficulty as a chance to really enjoy playing. In all of these leisure activities, what is the point of playing if not to play?
Ballesteros combined all of this with remarkable success. Could he have won more had he played with less risk? Probably. Would he have won as many hearts?
Through the many interviews done from The Anfield Wrap into Andoni Iraola the idea of winning hearts rips through them. He’s loved at Rayo Vallecano and at Bournemouth as Phil Kitromilides, Sam Davies and James Roach all attested to. Journalists like Sid Lowe, Guillem Balagué and Jonathan Northcroft who have spent time with him speak with real fondness. All those interviews are on The Anfield Wrap’s app and all are worth listening to. This is a man people have really warmed to – all want to see him do well.
It’s the football that does that first and foremost; not the idea he is sound though that appears to be the case too. The approach is what wins hearts over and this is always the case with this thing of ours:
What matters is what happens on the grass. What is true is what happens on the grass. Everything else is fluff.
Too much recently has not been focusing on that – since October 2025 his league winning predecessor lost a lot of games of football and just did not get many points. The football – on the grass – was not what people wanted to watch and his players did not look like they wanted to play it and it is reasonable to say, one glorious day down Ten Streets way aside, it was trending towards getting worse for both results and performance.
It’s on the grass with risks and courage that Andoni Iraola has become well known and while talking at length to Melissa Reddy we discussed his desire to continue playing and playing even when there is upheaval. Last year’s Premier League was too much of a burden for Liverpool. Almost every side found that to be the case but Liverpool had been Champions, had the most terrible tragedy happen, made some bad decisions that undermined their ability to be good on the grass and then bad luck hit combined with some more bad decisions and it removed all joy from the enterprise. It left them only with the burden.
That needs to stop, needs to be reset and this is part of that. The ultimate purpose of the reset is to bring victories back on the pitch. Liverpool are choosing to commit to a front foot approach and I hope that is the case off the pitch too – Liverpool need a lot of players to come in and be part of this new thing.
Also, Andoni Iraola will want to be judged by the same key metric as all his predecessors, he has to be here to win. Despite last season he is managing a super club. One in the Premier League, yes. One who had a poor season last season? Undoubtedly. But one already with a lot of talent in its ranks. He’d want nothing less than that too, by all accounts. Liverpool is not and never can be an art project or a finishing school. We will have one of the biggest budgets in world football and the output should be compared against that. He is not coming in as Gerard Houllier, Rafa Benitez or Jürgen Klopp did, despite last season’s issues.
The idea of the journey though is thoroughly exciting. The feeling that teams could well be crawling off the pitch after facing Liverpool makes my heart pound. I want risks taken, I want bunkers to be opportunities for verve and fizz, I want to say “fuck you, why not” and I want every single fibre to be about looking and going forward.
There is going to be upheaval and churn. The meaty teams will have their own plans to get meatier. Great, let’s try and turn them into mince and let’s do that altogether saying “fuck you, why not” because what’s the point of playing if not to play. Let’s play and play and play.
Loads to do. Loads to get our teeth into. Loads to devour. Loads to enjoy.
Into these.
Neil
