Jurgen Klopp made it crystal clear that Liverpool will continue their search in the transfer market for further additions to the squad beyond Dominik Szoboszlai and Alexis Mac Allister.
“It will happen. We will have a good team,” the German promised supporters in a rare appearance on the club’s official podcast.
The question that then remains is how exactly the club will look to replace both Fabinho and Jordan Henderson this summer, whilst also not neglecting the backline.
That becomes a trickier conundrum for Liverpool to solve, especially given that quality left-footed centre-halves are as hard to come by of late as specialist No.6s – forget about getting either cheaply.
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It remains to be seen whether there’s now space in the budget for us to adequately fill the void set to be left by our two senior stars’ impending departures AND sign a new centre-half.
With that in mind, the likeliest course of action the club will probably take is to land two new midfielders to plug the gap.
Romeo Lavia at £50m is an odds-on favourite to pull on the famous red shirt this summer with Betfair (via the Liverpool Echo) putting us as strong favourites ahead of Arsenal, Chelsea and Newcastle United.
We do have our reservations about Liverpool signing another 19-year-old (regardless of how highly-talented) to replace an experienced operator in Fabinho in the middle of the park.
In that vein of thought, we’d be far from surprised to witness Jorg Schmadtke and Co. bring in an additional, more senior option to restore faith in the midfield.
The likes of Florentino Luis, Cheick Doucoure and Palhinha, among others, have been touted as potential transfer pathways, with the Crystal Palace man perhaps the most likely option at this stage when factoring in the rough asking price.
Crystal Palace would only entertain selling Cheick Doucoure for a minimum fee of £70m. Liverpool are interested in the midfielder and the club feel the valuation of £70-80m is fair for the player in the current market #CPFC
Following on from, @SamiMokbel81_DM reporting.
— Alex Howell (@iamAlexHowell) July 20, 2023
That would leave Liverpool with a mouth-watering £120m bill to pay to replenish their midfield this summer, assuming that we couldn’t manage to negotiate down any of the two asking prices put before us.
It’s, of course, worth factoring in the £52m we’re poised to earn from Henderson and Fabinho’s exits, which would at least make more than a dent in that figure.
Importantly, we’d have a reasonably well-stocked midfield and have completely transformed the age profile of the department ahead of our opening Premier League fixture at Stamford Bridge on 13th August.
#Ep82 of The Empire of the Kop Podcast: Who do Liverpool replace Henderson & Fabinho with?