Remember Maxi Rodriguez?
Vageuly? Same here so not to worry.
You may not be as interested in the training regimes of the Argentine who spent two seasons at Anfield but the habits of Steven Gerrard and Luis Suarez makes for more interesting reading.
Darren Burgess was fitness and conditioning coach for Liverpool between 2010 and 2012 and has worked with a number of Reds’ fan favourites.
“Stevie was obsessive about every detail,” he told the Liverpool Echo.
“He showed his attention to detail on and off the field. His commitment to the club was total.
“If he saw something was happening around the club that was affecting performance he would intervene.
“He always wanted to know how far he had run and his speed.”
Burgess, now the high performance manager of Aussie Rules side Port Adelaide, was speaking during Liverpool’s pre-season tour Down Under and said that Maxi Rodriguez was just the opposite of Gerrard.
“Maxi, in contrast, just wanted to play,” Burgess said. “Maxi was probably my favourite player because of what he could do with a ball but he didn’t want to run much.”
And in terms of hard workers, Burgess revealed that there were few who applied themselves more than Luis Suarez.
“There were different types. Luis Suarez had never been to the gym before he joined from Ajax so it was a case of educating him about the benefits.
“There were times in pre-season with Luis when you’d have to take him out of training. He wanted to do too much – he lives and breathes football.
“Him, Maxi, (Fabio) Aurelio and (Sebastian) Coates would then go into the indoor area and just have shots on goal for the next hour and a half. I’d then have to go there to stop them from doing that.”
It’s lucky he left before the arrival of Mario Balotelli. If he thought Maxi was lazy…
