Jamie Carragher has recounted his experience of being confronted by an ex-Liverpool teammate over comments that he’d made as a pundit.
Since calling time on his playing career in 2013, the former Reds defender has been a fixed presence in the Sky Sports studio (and indeed for other networks), and he hasn’t been afraid to voice some forthright opinions about the Merseysiders.
A few years ago, he called for the club to cash in on Daniel Sturridge, who he felt was a potentially lucrative asset despite struggling for starts by the time that Bobby Firmino and Sadio Mane had come to Anfield.
Carragher recalls being confronted by Sturridge
In the latest Fan Debate on The Overlap, Carragher recalled how the ex-Liverpool striker (who he briefly played alongside prior to his retirement 12 years ago) confronted him over those comments during an end-of-season friendly against Sydney FC in May 2017, and he actually appreciated the forward’s reaction.
The pundit said: “There’s one player with me, it was Daniel Sturridge. He was still playing at the end with Klopp, and it was funny.
“You wouldn’t believe this, but when I’d stopped playing for a couple of years, Liverpool asked me and Stevie Gerrard to go on the end-of-season game in Australia. You wouldn’t believe, Liverpool couldn’t sell the tickets to fill out the stadium, so they asked me, Stevie, and Steve McManaman to play with the team.
“We ended up playing, and I’d said they needed to sell Daniel Sturridge. He fronted me in the dressing room when we got over there, and you know what? I was a bit like ‘Fair play’. You know what I mean? Good on you.
“There’s nothing worse, I think, if someone backs down, so I wasn’t going to – not that it was a big argument – but sometimes, maybe if I was a player or a journalist, I might say something and he’d back down and go ‘Oh, sorry, I didn’t mean it’. No, just front it.”
Carragher had meant Sturridge sale claims as a compliment
What Carragher stressed at the time that he called for Sturridge to be sold was that he actually meant it with the best of intentions for our one-time number 15.
It wasn’t a case of the pundit not rating the striker or being frustrated by his catalogue of injuries, but rather that he believed the ex-Chelsea forward ought not to be satsfied with a backup role under Klopp, and that Liverpool could yield a sizeable transfer fee for him at the time.
Although Sturridge was ultimately left behind by the famed front three of Mo Salah, Firmino and Mane, he’d been pat of another magnificent forward trio earlier in his Anfield career along with Luis Suarez and Raheem Sterling, who between them came agonisingly close to firing us to Premier League glory in 2013/14.
Carragher was clearly appreciative of his former teammate challenging him to his face rather than being dishonest, and it appears that any possible tension between the duo was cleared in that moment during the trip to Australia eight years ago.
