Liverpool are once again looking ahead to what is expected to a be a busy transfer window.

The Reds have been generally excellent in the market during the past 10 years or so, with pioneering data informing who they should and should not be targeting.

One person who was previously absolutely key to getting those things right was former director of research Ian Graham.

Graham spent 10 years at Anfield before leaving in 2023 and was the man behind many of Liverpool’s best signings during that period.

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Since leaving the Reds, Graham has written a whole book detailing the good and the bad from his time at the club.

And as another window now looms, the data expert has been looking back on the differences between Brendan Rodgers and Jurgen Klopp in terms of their approach to new signings.

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During Rodgers’ time as Liverpool manager, the Reds’ record in the transfer market was patchy at best.

There were some good signings, but plenty of misses too.

And speaking to BBC Sport, Graham says Rodgers was often at loggerheads with the data team regarding transfer suggestions.

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“Previously, we had robust debates with Brendan about which players to sign and the two differences were our ideas about which players would improve Liverpool were very different to Brendan’s ideas,” he said.

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“Brendan, understandably, put a big premium on Premier League experience whereas we felt those players were quite often overvalued by the market and players from other markets, like Mo Salah and Roberto Firmino, were undervalued.”

Rodgers is said to have “came in with a preconception that the player he wanted to sign was the only solution for that position” and that “it was very difficult to persuade him otherwise.”

Firmino was a prime example of someone who was signed by Rodgers but was quite blatantly not the manager’s player.

He simply did not know how to use the Brazilian.

Once Klopp arrived, he got the best out of Firmino and ultimately turned the former Hoffenheim man into a modern day Liverpool legend.

And according to Graham, Klopp was the ‘missing piece’ as far as aligning the club’s approach to data-led transfers.

The German is described as being ‘a manager who seemed to see what the data saw’.

“He [Jurgen] is very happy to thank us for our suggestions to have stopped some of the less sensible signings, which at the time caused big arguments but, in retrospect, he could see this was a good process for signing players,” Graham adds.

The former employee may have now left the building, but with his former colleague Michael Edwards still very much in the picture at Liverpool, this process is set to continue for the foreseeable.