While we might be on the verge of April, the knock-on effects from a mid-season World Cup mean Liverpool still have 12 Premier League matches remaining at this later stage of the campaign and, as a result, still have no idea if they will actually be competing in next year’s Champions League or not.
The Reds, who have ultimately struggled this season, sit sixth in the table ahead of their return to domestic action away at Man City on Saturday lunchtime. Meanwhile, they have a six-point deficit to make up on the top four.
But while they boast two games in hand on Tottenham Hotspur, who currently occupy the final Champions League spot, and host the Lilywhites at Anfield next month, they still find themselves five points behind fifth-placed Newcastle United, despite having completed a league double over the Magpies and played the same total of games played. Throw in the fact that Brighton & Hove Albion will overtake Liverpool if they win their own outstanding match, and the race for the top four remains on a knife-edge with the Reds’ own hopes firmly in the balance.
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As a result, Liverpool’s transfer planning perhaps isn’t as developed as you would normally expect at this time of the year, with club bosses putting together a longlist of would-be targets with one eye on the summer. After all, not only are the Reds unable to guarantee Champions League football to would-be signings, they are not yet able to count upon the riches from qualifying for Europe’s elite club competition either.
A midfield revamp is very much Liverpool’s biggest priority this summer, having spent the last year overhauling their attack. With Naby Keita, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, James Milner, and Juventus loanee Arthur Melo not contracted beyond the end of the season, and Fabinho soon joining Jordan Henderson and Thiago Alcantara on the wrong side of 30, multiple new arrivals are needed in the engine-room.
Jude Bellingham is well-documented to be the Reds’ number one target, while interest in Wolves’ Matheus Nunes is genuine. Meanwhile, they continue to be linked with Mason Mount amid his contract impasse with Chelsea, with Football.London reporting that Liverpool are leading the chase for his signature if he does move on.
In an ideal world, perhaps the trio would make up Jurgen Klopp’s ‘perfect’ summer transfer business. They would arguably cost close to £200m between them but the three midfielders the Reds have been linked with most certainly all tick Liverpool boxes and fit their preferred profile of player.
Yet the uncertainty at Anfield ensures they aren’t alone, with the list of potential midfield targets believed to be higher than usual at this stage of the campaign as the Reds hurtle towards a major summer. ‘Expect plenty of transfer links as a result in the coming weeks,’ the ECHO’s Liverpool FC correspondent Paul Gorst would warn earlier this month.
This is certainly true when you start to total up all the midfielders the Reds continue to be linked with.
But while Bellingham, Nunes, and Mount would all fit that desired Liverpool profile of talented young players who will only get better, and still possess resale value, the Reds have also been linked with a number of players you normally wouldn’t expect them to consider.
Chelsea pair Mateo Kovacic and N’Golo Kante, Southampton’s James Ward-Prowse, Napoli’s Piotr Zielinski, Inter Milan's Marcelo Brozovic, and Juventus’ Adrien Rabiot have all been linked at one point or another in recent weeks. Between them, they have expiring contracts, face the looming threat of relegation, or have previously been of interest to Liverpool bosses, so could be cut-price alternatives to a Bellingham as a result.
Yet Rabiot is the youngest of the quintet and will celebrate his 28th birthday next week. Zielinksi, Kovacic, and Ward-Prowse all turn 29 later this year, Brozovic is 31 in November, and Kante is on the verge of his 32nd birthday. In other words, the only way is down in terms of performance as they navigate their peaks. The Reds already boast enough midfielders in such waters.
Traditionally, Liverpool do not sign such players. Klopp has signed 32 players since the start of his first full season at Anfield, with Ragnar Klavan, Alex Manninger, Adrian, and Andy Lonergan the only signings aged over 30 when they joined the club. AKA a £4.2m reserve centre-back and three back-up goalkeepers, two of which never kicked a ball competitively for the club.
Virgil van Dijk, Xherdan Shaqiri, Thiago Alcantara, and Arthur are the only other signings over the age of 25 when signed by the Reds, and even then three of them were 26 with the Spaniard the odd one out at 29. Admittedly he is a rare exception to Liverpool’s transfer policy as they snapped up a world class player for an initial £20m.
Meanwhile, Gini Wijnaldum, Mohamed Salah, Alisson Becker, and Ben Davies are the only 25 year olds brought in. In other words, the rest were nowhere near entering their peak years upon arrival at Anfield. When the Reds sign player, it is nearly always with one eye on a long-term future at the club.
In contrast, when other clubs have signed older players, Klopp has commented publicly how it is only short-term business.
“It is obviously not a team built for the next 20 years because the players they signed are for now, but for now it is really good,” he would say of Manchester United ahead of Liverpool’s 7-0 thrashing of the Red Devils earlier this month.
Meanwhile, as United vied with Man City to sign a veteran Cristiano Ronaldo in the summer of 2021, he warned: “It’s not about me to judge that. It’s about if other clubs can do things like this, it’s obviously not business for the future. In three or four years we will have the benefit of that, it’s for now and immediately if that happens.
“That is how some clubs are obviously working and that is absolutely fine, but there must be different ways. There must be a team a year later and two years later, for us at least. And three years later as well.
“You need success. We felt that if you can win trophies it is great but it’s not, even with the best squad in the world, possible every year. If that’s not possible, you still need to make sure you develop as a team and a club.
“That’s what we did and that’s what we do. Anything else is really not in our hands. We watch it like all of you and will see what happens.”
So what can we take from such comments? Are such reports therefore wide of the mark, and ones we can arguably dismiss as ‘agent talk’ with it well-known that Liverpool will sign multiple midfielders this summer?
Or is the uncertainty at Anfield forcing the Reds to be less fussy, resulting in them casting their net out further as they weigh up options they previously wouldn’t have considered? In search of a short-term upturn as they look to swiftly end to this transitional period, perhaps that chance of stance is needed.
Yet your gut feeling would suggest that Liverpool will stick to their model and look to move for the likes of Bellingham, Nunes, and Mount. Their attacking overhaul, signing Luis Diaz, Darwin Nunez, and Cody Gakpo in the space of 12 months, would suggest as much too, though whether that is possible without the offers of Champions League football remains to be seen.
But considering those three attacking signings came out of the blue, somewhat, perhaps we should expect the unexpected as the speculation around Anfield continues. The Reds' transfer model might make the picture on front of the box relatively clear, but, for now, we wait to see which pieces of the puzzle go where.
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