One journalist believes that Liverpool could be in the ‘conversation’ to raid a fellow Premier League club for one of their key players in the January transfer window.
As per Football Insider and 90min, the Reds have recently been linked with Lloyd Kelly, with Tottenham and Newcastle also believed to be interested in the Bournemouth defender.
Speaking to GIVEMESPORT, Dean Jones hinted that Jurgen Klopp might feel a need to go after the 24-year-old when the market reopens in the winter.
The journalist said: “There’s a possibility that Liverpool could join the race on that one. It’s a bit of a strange situation in the way that it kind of fizzled out at the end of the transfer window, and Tottenham were obviously the hottest link to him at that point.
“But when you consider what Liverpool might be needing in the January transfer window as they start to tweak the squad, it wouldn’t be a complete surprise at all if they were mentioned again in the Lloyd Kelly conversation.”
With all four of Liverpool’s summer signings being midfielders, it was obvious what part of the squad took priority for the Anfield recruitment team over the past few months.
A spate of midfield departures made that focus a necessity, but with Klopp’s options in that area of the pitch nicely reinvigorated, the attention may well switch to defensive reinforcements in January, as Jones has hinted.
Trent Alexander-Arnold is currently the only senior natural right-back we have, with Conor Bradley sidelined until November at the earliest, while the recent absences of Virgil van Dijk and Ibrahima Konate have put our centre-back depth to the test.
Joe Gomez and Joel Matip have stepped up commendably over the last couple of games, with Jarell Quansah also showing signs of early promise, although the Cameroon international will be out of contract next summer.
Also, many of our current central defenders have been prone to injury issues throughout their respective Reds careers, as was starkly illustrated during the troublesome 2020/21 season when the inexperienced Nat Phillips and Rhys Williams were thrown in at the deep end for a period.
Signing Kelly would give Liverpool an option who’d help towards the homegrown quota, is primarily left-footed (unlike those at Anfield who play in his position) and should be coming into his peak years (he turns 25 next month).
He could well be regarded as a primary target for Klopp in January, depending on the centre-back situation at that time, and we reckon the LFC recruitment team will be keeping a close watch on the Bournemouth defender over the coming months.
#Ep89 of The Empire of the Kop Podcast: EOTK Insider with Neil Jones🎙️