Could Roma’s Pjanic be a potential Gerrard ‘replacement’?

With Liverpool’s current captain, Steven Gerrard, due to leave the club in the summer, the hunt is hopefully very much on to replace him when that time comes. Given the debacle that became the process of replacing Luis Suarez (that still hasn’t happened), Reds will be hoping that the club has plans in place to properly fill the void that will be left by Gerrard when the time finally comes.

Sadly, there have been a number of underwhelming names mentioned, with Fabian Delph of Aston Villa chief amongst them, whilst in recent days the Villa player has been cited more as a potential replacement for the potentially out-going Lucas Leiva.

In the meantime, over the past few days, Liverpool’s name has been linked to that of Roma’s starring man Miralem Pjanic. After a relative coup for the Italian side when signing the player in 2011 for a measly 11 million Euros, the Bosnia & Herzegovina midfielder has only recently found his true form under current Roma manager Rudi Garcia who guided the Rome-based side to 2nd in Seria A last season with Pjanic in a starring role.

What would Pjanic bring to LFC? Well, he is currently developing into a genuine mature, intelligent midfielder, having been moved further forward in the past 2 seasons to play closer to Roma legend Francesco Totti. Much like Gerrard in the middle period of his career, Pjanic likes to alternate between dropping further back to act as deep-lying playmaker but is much more at home when roaming further forward, preferably behind a clever forward man that shows good movement.

In the past 18 months, he has become perhaps Roma’s most important player, given the age of Totti but there is no doubting the Italian legend has helped the midfielder come on under the current manager. Whilst Pjanic may never be an ‘all-rounder’ in the way Gerrard has over the years, combining crunching tackles and a ‘box-to-box’ game, with perfect 70-yard cross-field passes and world class goals, he would at least have the ability to replace the creative side of Gerrard’s game, whilst the likes of Henderson, Can and Lucas (for however much longer he’s here) can give him the platform to orchestrate.

On the other hand, creatively speaking, Pjanic’s current stats don’t impress too highly, with just 30 career goals across a 7 1/2 year career but in his most effective season to date, he managed 11 goals for Lyon in the season he turned 21, whilst he has only been used most effectively in the past 18 months at Roma, during which time he’s scored 9 goals. And let’s not forget, you rarely see a truly prolific player in the Serie A outside of the odd world class striker.

Then you have the further comparisons with Gerrard who, at 24, had still yet to have his first truly prolific season for Liverpool which came in the season he turned 25, scoring 23 goals in all competitions after Rafa Benitez appeared to have found the keys to unlocking Gerrard’s potential. Which again speaks to the fact that it often takes a manager that fully understands a player’s game to truly get the best out of him.

The 24 year old has yet to truly reach world class level, but there is not doubting that he has many of the attributes required to become one of the games elite and under the guidance of a talented coach, he could easily reach his potential but at the moment he is still an unfinished diamond. In many ways though, this could play to Liverpool’s advantage, with the fee for the midfielder reported to be in the region of £23-25 million.

If the Reds could get that kind of money together, either in January or the summer, then a potential Gerrard replacement may not be too far off. Roma president, James Palotta, has even gone on record confirming the Reds interest in the past few days saying “The Liverpool thing with Pjanic is the same. We have another four years with him, and we love him.” so while there may be interest from our side, there will clearly be some work to be done to make the move happen.

How do you feel about Pjanic; does he have the ability to eventually fill the hole that the captain will leave in the summer? Let us know how you’d feel about the Roma man.