Does Andy Carroll have a future at Liverpool?

Andy Carroll’s winning goal for West Ham United against Swansea City last weekend brought the striker firmly back into focus for Liverpool fans. Paul Gorst discusses what the future holds in the store for the Reds’ record signing.

With just a third of the Premier League season left to play, Brendan Rodgers has a decision to make regarding Andy Carroll.

Carroll’s name has been largely absent in connection with LFC since wildly inaccurate reports claimed Rodgers was trying to bring the striker back from his loan at West Ham United as the Reds soldiered on through the autumn months with just Luis Suarez as their only fit striker.

Carroll has also spent large chunks of his loan at the Hammers on the fringes, after suffering injuries in the games against Fulham and Manchester United.

However, the former Newcastle United man claimed the only goal of the game in West Ham’s 1-0 win over Swansea City in his first start since November, something which has not gone unnoticed with Reds fans.

Nor too will it have gone unseen by Rodgers who has a big decision to make over the Reds’ record signing’s future.

When Carroll returns from his loan deal with Sam Allardyce’s side, it will have been two and a half years since Kenny Dalglish re-invested £35m of the £50m received from Chelsea for Fernando Torres in Carroll, who had at the time, just a handful of Premier League games to his name.

Carroll will never be a ‘£35m player’ but love or hate his bustling playing style, there is no denying the 24-year-old is not without his virtues – they are there for all to see.

However, his battering ram approach is not a brand of attack that is favoured with the man who matters most at Anfield. Rodgers prefers the lock-pick to the sledge hammer when trying to open the doors of opposition defences.

So what does Rodgers do?

There are reports that West Ham have a clause that states they will purchase the striker outright for £17m should they stay up this season, and as they sit 11^th with 30 points at the time of writing, it looks likely that their stay in the top flight will be extended.

However, do the London side really have the funds to spend £17m on just one addition to their squad, particularly a player who reportedly earns around £70k per-week at Anfield?

And haven’t Liverpool been here before with reports of loaned players being bought at the end of their spell?

It took the Reds the best part of three years to rid themselves of Alberto Aquilani after stints with AC Milan and Juventus and Joe Cole’s purported transfer to Lille at the end of his loan failed to materialise.

Carroll is perhaps the personification of a transfer strategy that the Reds would prefer was ignored and quietly confined to the history books. Indeed, the decadent spending of 2011 has been largely curtailed during the Rodgers regime, yet Liverpool cannot simply bury their head in the sand with him.

Take the £17m (assuming the West Ham deal goes through) and the Reds can take that sizeable chunk of change to invest back into the squad, but it would still represent a remarkable come-down for the club who made him the ninth most expensive player of all time just two calendar years ago.

The alternative however sees an England striker kicking his heels on the bench as his team-mates cultivate a style of football that is totally conflicting to his own specific style of play.

It is a decision Rodgers must get right this summer.