Woah...a lot to unpack here. Not going to respond to it all coherently and others have articulated a lot of what I think already but a couple of reflections:

1. Success is not as binary as has been made out. You have to apply context to every situation, as Jazz and others have explained. We should judge each season on its own merits and within the context it was completed. It's also relative; you should judge it based on where we've come from. Slot winning the league in his first season ignores the context of Liverpool being consistently competitive for a number of years under Klopp (plus...Mo Salah as a generational talent).

2. Secondly and apologies if this more personal but I think managing your own expectations has to come into this discussion. The trajectory of this season has been telegraphed for some time based on the clear problems we've had up front all season. And that was a failing of the summer window, the way we approached it as a club etc. But if you constantly recalibrate your expectations to 'high' every time there's even a sniff of weakness from our rivals, you're going to end up being more devasted than you need to be and subsequently project our situation as being far more dire than it actually is. Which is why everyone from the Kroenke's down to Arteta, our captain and most of the other players are getting accused of being failures this week. Which I don't believe is accurate or in proportion. The club fucked up this summer but to suggest that everyone involved in this project is a failure is misaligned to reality.

Sicario2 - Tier 1 We aren't getting no results, like I said this year is down to poor squad numbers but last year we pushed City hard until the end. You could argue Klopp had a better side and only managed one title. I wouldn't class his time as a failure.

Inter beat with a bit of a dodgy pen, it was a very close game but thought we looked better than them on the day. I rate Inzaghi but I don't agree that bringing him in will win us anything or make us any better.

Like I said the summer will tell us a lot, if we sign the players we need I see no reason we can't push on. The level we are now is our floor level with all these players injured. Liverpool will win the title but if they had injuries like us they wouldn't even be in the top 4 let alone

RocktheCasbah for sure, but the closest I've seen to wanting the manager's head on a spike is Sicario (and even he only wants to get a new manager if we don't win any trophies next season either, which I don't think is all that unreasonable). But I interpreted your post to being about a general mood rather than just Sicario's posts. The part I disagreed with is exactly the part I quoted - that you don't see why there's anger considering where we were some years ago.

QuincyAbeyie

I think I'm just looking at a game like last night's and a point away at the team directly below us and not really understanding why everyone's so pissed off about our struggles to score goals given the state of the forward line at the moment.

I get there's a wider point about the summer recruitment and it's completely fair to say it was disastrous, but in the here and now of not having any of our first choice front three + Jesus available, it's not really rocket science that we are struggling. And it's not like we're in the first ten games and Forest's league position is a mirage, at this point in the season they're up there by right.

Don Pacifico nor do I believe his approach to squad building is what's got us here

I don’t understand how anyone can reasonably come to that view. Genuinely open to hearing the justification as I just can’t look at the signings Arteta has made for the front three positions (excluding Havertz as that clearly wasn’t the original intention) and think it isn’t a contributory factor when you consider how widely he has been backed for other signings.

Tam it’s very easy to come to that view actually. For a few reasons

1) Forward market is much more competitive than defense and midfield market. Look at the money spent on guys like Mudryk, Sancho, Grealish etc. There are no middling defenders going for £80m. People just value forwards more (cos game is about goals) ans will pay much more

2. This cost is partly driven by low supply. Academies are training midfielders and defenders. Teams often have 1-2 actual strikers.
3. Some of our very best forwards were academy grads. So we didn’t have to go spend £150m on Saka and Martinelli. We’d made them.

Yeah. This season is a show of shit. But when Arteta himself has come out many times to say he wants forwards, and we’ve made bids, the idea that he doesn’t want forwards just doesn’t fly.

Tam because I still believe there are plans in place to fix our forward line. If I didn't think that, then I'd question our squad building.

Our attack was prolific last season. Despite this, we all knew there were still weaknesses, as did Arteta hence why we were looking at forwards in the summer. The fact we didn't sign any isn't a flaw of squad building.

Don Pacifico one of the issues I had with the we scored the most goals argument last season which got transferred into we don't need more in attack, was that we scored lots of goals in some games but failed to score in too many and we've seen that again. This is a problem the team has had for two seasons and we don't seem to have been and to respond to it. There have been too many 0 games in the last 2 years and that costs you titles.

Qwiss you got me. My real name is Tyler Durden.

Claudius
70m on Merino and Calafiori - the latter being one of the more complicated deals these last few years - while getting in Sterling who got fuck all minutes certainly insinuates that he has either unrealistic demands from his forward targets or some other problem. We don't struggle to get defender or goalies over the line, even now we have Zubimendi and another goalie on the horizon but Jesus and Trossard in eleven windows is just shocking.

jones this is how talent markets work. Every company I work with in SA struggles to get good full stack devs. Consistent problem. It’s not for a lack of effort. Oh, they have analysts coming out the arse.

Claudius so let's say we have a fact - that it's harder to sign forward players than defenders.

Is our conclusion from this that it's impossible to say if we've done a good enough job of strengthening our forward line?

Don Pacifico Our attack was prolific last season. Despite this, we all knew there were still weaknesses, as did Arteta hence why we were looking at forwards in the summer. The fact we didn't sign any isn't a flaw of squad building.

Can there only be flaws with the squad building if we weren't looking? If we look for players every season, then don't manage to sign those we're looking at, and then don't sign adequate alternatives, I see that as a flaw with the squad building.

jones I don't have a problem with either of those two deals. Tomi is injury prone, we are going to lose Zinchenko & Tierney and possibly Kiwior this summer so getting Calafiori is fine, he also acts as backup for CBs. Likewise for Merino, we are going to lose Partey and Jorginho this window. Sometimes you need to bring in the replacements a window or two before and that for me is being proactive.

The main problem for me was we went for Sesko and Williams, neither happened and we knew early it would be very difficult. But worryingly seemed like we had not backup or alterative lined up. This summer, if key targets aren't signed by mid July we simply have to move on to the next ones. Chasing players all summer to be rejected is what we used to do under Wenger, can not happen again.

Claudius I understand your points, but they are obstacles to be addressed, not reasons for taking no action. You've also picked three fairly poor buys to illustrate your point, which is in no way representative of the wider market of actual moves, or even potential moves that we might have made. There will have been dozens of potential options open to us across a wide range of value, alongside plenty where we could have forced the issue if we tried.

If the market is constrained and your preferred options aren't available, that's a sign you need to adapt your approach, tactics, or principles to what is available, rather than turning your nose up at what's on offer and middling through.

We've been fortunate to be blessed with Saka, and now Nwaneri coming through, as there is currently very little positive evidence (Odegaard aside) that Arteta is capable of making worthy attacking additions to the team.

Don Pacifico because I still believe there are plans in place to fix our forward line. If I didn't think that, then I'd question our squad building.

Our attack was prolific last season. Despite this, we all knew there were still weaknesses, as did Arteta hence why we were looking at forwards in the summer. The fact we didn't sign any isn't a flaw of squad building.

I've still got plans to fit into those 32 inch waist jeans in my wardrobe. Until I actually take some action the plans are all a bit meaningless, and the fact I've had plenty opportunity in recent times suggests the issue lies with me rather than the jeans.

JazzG Agreed, but I think that's possibly part of Jones' point there. That we could identify the issues in the deeper positions and make attempts to rectify it, but not do it further up the pitch, is just baffling. I refuse to believe it's due to the lack of options or prices of those available.

Tam Maybe but I think we got Havertz done pretty quick when we wanted him a couple years back, likewise moved quickly on Trossard when we lost out on Mudryk. We have neglected the attacking positions last summer, clear we needed at minimum one if not two players and ended up with zero. I honestly think if we had signed a top class wide player that alone would have made a massive difference, could have rotated our front players and maybe they wouldn't have got injured.

JazzG Even ignoring that he was supposed to be a CM the fact we got Havertz done pretty quick is not the argument you seem to think it is lol

It's actually mental, Chelsea initially refused to sell him we had to go in with several bids. He was a failure there for three years, had just two years left on his deal, they had just finished in 12th yet we paid them more than they paid Leverkusen initially ffs.