When Liverpool last made a high-profile mistake in the transfer market, Mason Mount and Reece James were still in school, Leicester City hadn't yet won the Premier League, Arsene Wenger was still in charge of Arsenal, and Frank Lampard hadn't yet called time on his days as a player.
It is perhaps no surprise, then, that Todd Boehly - Chelsea's new owner - is toying with the prospect of appointing Michael Edwards as Marina Granovskaia's replacement. Now unattached to a club after leaving Anfield at the end of last season, Edwards is the man credited with constructing arguably Liverpool's greatest-ever squad during his time on Merseyside.
With Granovskaia departing from her role at Stamford Bridge, Boehly has appointed himself as interim sporting director for the moment. The Blues are searching for a long-term successor, and Edwards has been identified as their top target.
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Speaking to Bloomberg last week, Boehly said: "If you look at the models that are very successful, Liverpool is a great model. Liverpool generates a couple of hundred million more revenue than Chelsea and they generate earnings, so there is an opportunity to compete."
While the LA Dodgers part-owner has a point, the infrastructure installed by Fenway Sports Group (FSG) since their takeover in October 2010 is the primary reason behind Liverpool's success, rather than any single individual. FSG have strived to refine an evidence-based approach to decision-making at Anfield, first appointing Damien Comolli to lead their football operations upon the recommendation of a certain Billy Beane, the man behind Moneyball.
The Frenchman promised data-driven practices in-keeping with what FSG had established at the Boston Red Sox, and he snatched Edwards from Tottenham Hotspur after the pair had previously worked together as colleagues at White Hart Lane. Edwards was initially appointed as head of analysis, and it was he who managed to convince Dr Ian Graham to leave his job at Decision Technology to become Liverpool's first-ever director of research.
FSG demonstrated a clear intent to quickly form a data science department, which was constructed from scratch and shaped according to Graham's vision. Curiously, the first analytics department in England was created by Chelsea around four years earlier.
Over a series of campaigns, Liverpool experienced several bumps in the road. Comolli's analysis wasn't always watertight and in Brendan Rodgers, the Reds had a manager who had too much faith in his own gut feeling to truly empower others.
The current Leicester City boss conflicted with Edwards as part of a transfer committee, with Thomas Tuchel regarded as a vaguely comparable character based on his fallings out with those above him at both Borussia Dortmund and Paris Saint-Germain. By the time Jurgen Klopp was appointed in 2015, Comolli had left and Edwards had been growing in prominence at the club for around four years. Graham had spent a similar amount of time building recruitment applications behind the scenes.
The Reds had been refining their football operation since FSG completed their takeover. From Klopp's appointment onwards, the club were able to reap the rewards of what they had been patiently building behind the scenes since 2010. Klopp, Edwards and Graham formed an effective unit alongside scouts Dave Fallows and Barry Hunter.
Edwards certainly proved to be effective in his role as sporting director after being promoted in November 2016, but he undeniably profited from the timing of his step into the spotlight. Liverpool had an elite manager in place by then, and Graham had spent half a decade getting to grips with the best ways in which to use statistics to gain an edge in the transfer market.
With everything streamlined, Edwards simply had to begin steering the ship. If he was to be appointed at the Bridge in the near future, by contrast, his role would almost be more comparable to that of Comolli.
Edwards wouldn't necessarily have to start from scratch at Chelsea, but the Blues aren't in the same position of readiness that Liverpool were back in 2015. Acquiring his services would be a start for Boehly but contrary to popular belief, the ex-Reds chief is not a magician, he was simply the face of a well-oiled entity.
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