Andoni Iraola's Ruthless Decisions for Liverpool Champions League Squad
Andoni Iraola has wasted no time drawing hard lines at Liverpool. Before a ball has even been kicked in Europe, he has made two big calls that echo around Anfield: Federico Chiesa and Wataru Endo are out of his 2026-27 Champions League squad.
No injury caveats. No gentle easing-in period for established internationals. Just a cold, 25-man list submitted to UEFA ahead of Liverpool’s opener against Atletico Madrid on September 9 – and their names nowhere to be seen.
Ruthless List, Ruthless Message
This isn’t just a whim. UEFA rules allow only 17 non-locally trained players on List A, and those slots are gold dust. Iraola chose to spend them on £123 million signing Bradley Barcola, fellow summer arrival Victor Munoz, and even Hugo Ekitike, who is currently injured.
That last decision says plenty. An unavailable forward, sidelined, still earns a place. Chiesa and Endo do not.
The numbers left no room for sentiment. The message was even clearer.
Carragher: “They’re Never Going to Play”
Jamie Carragher did not dress it up. Speaking on The Overlap, the former Liverpool defender cut straight through the polite language that usually surrounds big-name omissions.
“Liverpool have got two players in the squad who are never going to play,” he said. “And there are all these quotas, you can only have 17 players and all that. They have got Chiesa and Endo. It’s like they are never going to kick a ball.”
He then turned the spotlight on the club’s summer decision-making, particularly around Endo.
“Endo should have been moved on,” Carragher added. “He has done great, a bit of a cult hero.”
Cult status, though, doesn’t win you a Champions League place under a new manager with a clear, uncompromising vision.
Two Careers Stalled
Both players are tied down on long contracts – Endo until 2027, Chiesa until 2028 – but their Liverpool futures already feel fragile.
Endo’s decline in influence has been stark. Last season he managed just eight Premier League appearances and a single Champions League outing. From early enthusiasm to late-season afterthought, his trajectory has been heading in one direction.
Chiesa’s story has been different, but no less frustrating. His time at Anfield has been punctured by fitness issues, every hint of momentum checked by another setback. At 28, he should be in his prime. Instead, he is again nursing a muscle injury and watching the season’s biggest stage from the outside.
This latest problem is not considered long-term, yet that almost makes Iraola’s decision more brutal. Liverpool have registered long-term absentees like Conor Bradley and Giovanni Leoni ahead of a player who is edging back towards fitness. That choice underlines just how far Chiesa has slipped down the pecking order.
Europe Moves On Without Them
Liverpool’s focus, publicly at least, stays on the games in front of them. Ipswich Town visit Anfield on Friday in the league, a domestic hurdle to clear before Atletico arrive and the new-look Champions League league phase begins.
It’s a demanding schedule: Inter away, Fenerbahce away, and the kind of travel and intensity that define a season. Iraola has nailed his colours to a particular group of players for that journey.
Chiesa and Endo are not among them.
For now, their horizons narrow to domestic cup ties and whatever league minutes they can claw back. Only a serious injury crisis and a permitted squad alteration later in the campaign looks capable of dragging them back into European relevance.
Until then, Liverpool march into Europe with a new hierarchy and a new edge. The question is no longer whether Chiesa and Endo can force their way into Iraola’s plans for the Champions League.
It’s whether they will still be at Anfield by the time the next one comes around.
