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By the time Liverpool begin their first pre-season match on Wednesday, the World Cup will have been over for less than 72 hours. For fans wondering how they'll spend an offseason devoid of football, the gap between football (world) and football (club) is now the same as the space between matches in a busy December fixture list or during a week with Champions League football. These tiny gaps will be something to get used to this fall.
There's more than one sentimental fixture in Liverpool's list of seven pre-season matches, but none more so for Daniel Agger than the team's first versus his old club Brøndby. The Danish club have fallen on hard times since Agger's departure; although they won the league during his last full season before moving to Merseyside, they've since had financial struggles that nearly culminated in bankruptcy.
For Agger, it’s a chance to return home to a club and community he clearly loves, and with a team that his fellow Danes have also embraced. Saying that the match had him feeling like a kid, Agger clearly had a countdown clock going at home in advance of the match, such is his level of excitement.
I have waited 8 1/2 years for this game. Only 4 days to go!:) will be good to see the fans again! Y.N.W.A pic.twitter.com/TOgzWa2YgH
— Daniel Agger (@DanielAgger) July 12, 2014
Brøndby have apparently tried multiple times to make the match happen in the last several years, and many are interpreting the fact that it's finally happening as a covert signal that Agger's time with Liverpool is up. Pitching it as a testimonial of sorts, the selection of Brøndby as an opponent for a match that will be captained by the Dane is too much symbolism for some to bear, and thus it must add up to Brendan Rodgers carefully engineering the pre-season as a farewell tour for Agger.
Putting aside the fact that neither Rodgers nor Agger have said anything about the player moving on this summer, coupled with the rumours of Kolo Touré departing after just one season in red, it still seems unlikely that any club would go to this much effort to provide a nice send off for a popular player without making it an official send-off that comes with all the additional "last chance to see him play!" revenue streams.
Agger's future is still up in the air, insofar as anyone generating zero interest from other clubs has their future up in the air. That's not to say there isn't a chance he moves on by the end of the summer, just that sometimes a feel good friendly is just a feel good friendly and nothing more.
