Liverpool have a tried and tested formulae in recent transfer windows of explaining to trusted correspondents that they plan on doing very little, only to go and sign the players who they’ve denied interest in anyway.
The Echo famously told us how we were going to start Danny Ward in goal all season, only for Liverpool to break the world transfer record on Alisson a few days later.
The club publicly released a message apologising to Southampton and confirming our interest in Virgil van Dijk was withdrawn, only for us to sign the Dutchman a few months afterwards…
This summer, Liverpool repeatedly rejected any interest in Thiago, only to sign the Bayern Munich star as soon as his club agreed a bargain price for his departure.
This list can go on and on – but essentially – when Liverpool tell the local journalists they’re not signing anybody – despite it going against common sense – they can’t really be trusted!
Yesterday, the Athletic’s David Ornstein penned a column revealing that a source at the club had told him we were not going to sign a central defender in January.
Now, we’re not accusing him of making it up – we very much believe a source did tell him this – we just reckon it’s nonsense.
Even when Virgil van Dijk, Joe Gomez and Joel Matip were all fit, we were short at centre-back. Now with the first two of those three out of the season, we need one more than ever before.
By telling the world we’re in the market for one, prices go up – and the players filling in those positions are dealt a blow in that even if they do well – a shiny new defender will come in anyway.
There is no way the club won’t enforce the central defensive area this winter. We just don’t think we’ll know very much about the incoming man until the last minute.