Liverpool appear to be on the brink of signing Belgian international striker Christian Benteke from Aston Villa, with the Echo reporting that the Reds have agreed to meet his £32.5m buyout clause.
There has been a lot of opposition amongst fans to this deal going ahead, with many people pointing out Benteke’s less than inspiring goal record over the last couple of years – he scored 15 in all competitions last season – and his reputation as more of a target man, rather than a player who’ll get in behind defenders and cause problems.
We’ve certainly had mixed fortunes with the big men over the years, as the list below proves. Will Benteke prove to be any better than these five players who came before him?
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5) Rickie Lambert (2014-Present; 36 games, 3 goals)
Liverpool surprised almost everyone when we swooped for the England international last summer and re-signed a player that we had released 17 years earlier, when Lambert was part of our academy side. Unfortunately, he hasn’t been able to recreate the form he showed at Southampton thus far.
Having scored 28 Premier League goals during two seasons in the top flight with the Saints, he managed just two for the Reds last year – against Crystal Palace and Aston Villa. With Danny Ings among the new arrivals at Anfield this summer, Lambert’s time sadly looks to be running out.
4) Andy Carroll (2011-2013; 58 games, 11 goals)
Carroll will never be remembered all that fondly at Anfield while he remains our all-time record signing. However, his record for us isn’t as bad as you might believe. In fact, if it weren’t for his constant injury woes, he might have done a lot better on Merseyside in the long run.
He managed nine goals during his one full season at the club, including strikes in both the FA Cup semi-final against Everton and the FA Cup final against Chelsea, during which neither team seemed able to live with his presence. Unfortunately, those sort of performances were just too few and far between.
3) Karl-Heinz Riedle (1997-1999; 76 games, 15 goals)
The German veteran headed to Liverpool already in the twilight years of his career. Indeed, he retired just a couple of years after leaving us, finishing his career with Fulham. He was briefly a regular at Anfield before making way for the up and coming Michael Owen, who burst on to the scene around the same time.
He was brought in by Roy Evans along with Oyvind Leonardsen and Paul Ince, as the Reds looked to add experience to an otherwise youthful squad. His best moment arguably came right at the end of his Liverpool career, when he scored two goals against Hull City on his farewell appearance.
2) Peter Crouch (2005-2008; 134 games, 42 goals)
Crouch came to Liverpool from Southampton, something which is far more common these days, and had a more than respectable three year period at the club – reaching double figures for goals on each occasion. Crouch took 20 games to break his goal duck for the club, but once he did he never looked back.
He notably helped us win the FA Cup in 2006, setting up our second goal for captain Steven Gerrard, and got the winner against Chelsea in the Community Shield a couple of months later. He scored a memorable hat-trick against Arsenal in March 2007 and he ended that season as our top scorer, with 18 in all competitions.
1) Emile Heskey (2000-2004; 223 games, 60 goals)
Heskey set a club transfer record when he joined us from Leicester City at the start of the new century. He immediately struck up an impressive partnership with Michael Owen and in his first full season with the Reds he scored an impressive 22 goals in all competitions, helping us win the treble.
The goals continued to flow at a steady pace over the next three years. He perhaps never truly managed to live up to the expectations we had of him when we signed him, despite carding a similar goal record to that he enjoyed with the Foxes, and he’s since had to make do with a respectable career in the lesser regions of the top flight.
