Andy Carroll - The Most Expensive Purple Patch

Much has been made about Andy Carroll's form since his move to Merseyside. Since his £35m move he has found the back of the net 6 times in 33 games. A number of reasons have been cited for this, chief amongst them being Kenny Dalglish rotating the squad not allowing Carroll to gain some consistency. My theory is slightly different. I believe that Carroll was signed during a long purple patch, a great run of form that saw him score 30 goals in 62 games. An impressive record, admittedly 19 of those goals came in the Championship. But it's the period of his career before this time that makes me think that Carroll may have been performing about himself.

The season of Newcastle's relegation to the Championship saw Carroll appear 16 times, scoring only 3 goals. The season before he played 6 times for Newcastle without scoring and netted only once whilst on loan to Preston, featuring 12 times. Between the 06/07 season and the 08/09 season Carroll played 41 games and scored only 4 goals. Normally, young strikers coming through will show some sort of early form that can be an indication of what's to come. For example, in his first season for Leeds, Alan Smith scored 9 goals for in 26 appearances, most of them coming from the bench.  Similarly Wayne Rooney scored 8 in 37. These two were scoring goals and consistently showing promise and hit the headlines very quickly. Carroll only made 8 appearances in his first two seasons, scoring none. Although clearly the Newcastle management saw some potential in him, he wasn't grabbing headlines and didn't stand out as a future star.

His loan spell at Preston did little to show he would play at the highest level. Just one goal showed nothing that particularly impressed either Preston or Newcastle. 3 seasons in to his professional career Carroll had made just 29 appearances for Newcastle. At the same stage of his career, Alan Smith had made 116 appearances and scored 33 goals including 7 goals in 16 Champions League games. It wasn't until Carroll started to play regularly for Newcastle when they were relegated to the Championship that he began to develop a scoring run with 19 in 42 games. Unquestionably a good record, but nothing astonishing.

His first real run of Premier League games saw him score 11 goals in 19 games. Slightly better than a goal every other game, Carroll was finally starting to make a name for himself. Unfortunately, it was at this point when Liverpool were looking for someone to replace Fernando Torres who had just made the move to Stamford Bridge. When Liverpool offered £30m for someone who had been valued by Newcastle at just £1m only a year earlier, Mike Ashley must have nearly fainted. Liverpool had set themselves up to fail early on. Once it was made clear that they desperately needed a replacement for Torres, Newcastle had complete control over negotiations. £35m later, Carroll was a red.

Since that time he has netted just 6 times. He has been unfortunate in playing at a time when Gerrard has been injured and Dalglish has used squad rotation, not allowing Carroll to find some form. However, I still believe that this is not down to the tactics, the managers squad policy or even the change of clubs. I believe that Carroll is a decent striker, but probably not a top level striker. Clearly Newcastle didn't value him too greatly. If it would have, Carroll would have had a much higher price tag for a young player with potential. If Newcastle were willing to let him go for not too much more at that stage of his career, they must not have had a great amount of belief that he would become a world beater. The combination of pressure, and playing at a level beyond is, I believe the reason that his move to Liverpool has been a failure.