Former Liverpool forward Mark González has claimed he would have had a better career at the club if he’d joined after working with Marcelo Bielsa.
González joined Liverpool in 2006 in a £2.25m deal from Albacete but would only manage 36 appearances for the club in total before leaving for Real Betis in a £5.4m deal in 2007.
It was that year he first encountered Leeds boss Bielsa, working alongside the Argentine coach on the international stage with Chile.
Bielsa enjoyed a fruitful four-year spell in charge of La Roja, taking them to the World Cup in 2010, where they were eventually knocked out by Brazil in the last 16.
González was a star player under him, starting 21 times and shining during that 2010 World Cup run.
It was a period that the player believes was hugely beneficial for his career, claiming that if he’d worked with Bielsa before Liverpool, things would have turned out very differently on Merseyside.
“He’s the best manager I’ve ever had in my career,” he told Red Gol.
“He taught me a lot, to be able to use my movements and new ones, to take advantage of my speed. And I acquired it over time.
“I was very young at Liverpool; I didn’t have the experience I had when I came back to Católica.
“I learned a lot about tactics, and I wasn’t a crazy horse anymore, I understood the game.
“I thought that if I’d been at Liverpool at that time (after Bielsa), I’d be flying.”
