An Italian journalist has claimed that Liverpool are among multiple Premier League clubs to have submitted an offer for a Serie A forward.
Federico Chiesa has been continuously linked with the Reds over the past few months (years, even), and his name has come up in transfer dispatches yet again amid reported interest from his current employers Juventus in Genoa’s Mateo Retegui.
FOLLOW Empire of the Kop on Instagram (@empireofthekop) HERE
Fabio Santini told TV Play that the Bianconeri could be tempted to part with the 26-year-old if they were to receive roughly €45m (£39m) for him, saying: “What does Juventus do? Chiesa could be sold and not [Dusan] Vlahovic, as is being said.
“There are offers for Chiesa from the big names in the Premier League, in particular from Liverpool. By selling Chiesa they take home around €40m-€45m.
“With that figure Juventus can go knocking on Retegui’s door, who should not be seen here as a duplicate of Vlahovic, but if anything as his shoulder. Here too, Juventus will have to do, as they say in Milan, the calculations of the servant.”
Considering that it’s been just five days since Richard Hughes’ appointment as sporting director, and that we don’t know who’ll be managing Liverpool next season, we’d advise to take Santini’s claims of an offer from Merseyside with a pinch of salt.
Chiesa is an experienced operator with more than 300 senior appearances at club and international level behind him (Transfermarkt), and he was hailed as a ‘ruthless‘ attacker by one Italian journalist following a strong performance for the reigning European champions in November.
The 26-year-old would also offer plenty of positional versatility, capable of playing as a second striker, left winger or centre-forward (Transfermarkt).
However, one major red flag over the Juventus attacker is his woeful injury record. He’s had no fewer than 17 separate absences since the start of the 2021/22 season, the biggest of which was the cruciate ligament tear which sidelined him for nine months a couple of years ago (Transfermarkt).
No matter how good a player might be, someone so unreliable in terms of availability ought to be avoided. In any case, for all of Chiesa’s talents, Liverpool currently boast an abundance of riches in attack, so Hughes’ focus could well be on other parts of the squad in the summer transfer window.