Steven Gerrard Not Likely to Spend Off Season on Loan at Liverpool, but the Media Can Dream

In January when Steven Gerrard announced his intention to leave Liverpool FC at the end of season in order to move across the ocean and join LA Galaxy, the media and fans immediately began speculating that Gerrard might spend his MLS off season on loan at his boyhood club. It was not an unprecedented idea, with the likes of Landon Donovan and Thierry Henry having previously done the same at Everton and Arsenal respectively in order to maintain fitness before returning to training camp in mid-January.

It's an idea that didn't seem to have much benefit to either party involved. After playing football without much of a break since his post-World Cup vacation in July 2014, Gerrard could certainly use some time to rest his aging body before returning to a very physical league next season. For Liverpool, it was always going to be an issue of shoehorning a player into the side when the manager and team were trying to form a new identity that explicitly didn't revolve around the club's greatest ever player.

And so, naturally, the Independent casually revealed on Tuesday that despite getting to know his new team and contending with a very busy fixture list involving Liverpool participating in three separate competitions, Jürgen Klopp has had time to have several phone calls with an ex-player he'd never worked with to discuss that player's possible involvement between now and mid-January. Klopp is "now convinced that Gerrard’s presence will help define the standards of professionalism he expects around Melwood," or so the Independent claims.

Of course, even Klopp has caveats with the situation, allegedly agreeing only to Gerrard training with the club for now. LA Galaxy would reportedly seek a transfer fee in order to allow Gerrard to actually play competitive matches for Liverpool, and it makes zero financial sense for the Merseyside club to pay a fee for a player they don't need with such a small window of opportunity for playing in the first place.

Gerrard understandably misses the club, and perhaps even rues the lost opportunity to work with a manager like Klopp, no matter how much the midfielder insisted in the past he loved working with Rodgers. But time and distance are important when a club legend winds down his career the way Gerrard did at Liverpool, and there's a very palpable feeling of TOO SOON to this rumour. Coupled with LA Galaxy's desire that money exchange hands for Gerrard's off-season fitness boost, it seems highly unlikely that Gerrard will do much at Liverpool FC this fall except watch from the stands and have a casual kickabout with the lads at Melwood.