Liverpool assistant first team coach Pep Lijnders has expressed his surprise at how good summer signing Harvey Elliott is.
The 16-year-old was brought in from Fulham on a free transfer – although a compensation package will have to be sorted – and Lijnders has been blown away by his talent.
“What a surprise he was when he came in the first sessions,” he said at his pre match press conference on Tuesday, as per journalist Ian Doyle’s personal Twitter account.
“Some players play like they are 28,29. He sees so much around him before they happen. It’s not easy to come into our training and he showed from the first sessions. We are really happy he is with us.”
PL on Harvey Elliott: What a surprise he was when he came in the first sessions. Some players play like they are 28,29. He sees so much around him before they happen. It's not easy to come into our training and he showed from the first sessions. We are really happy he is with us.
— Ian Doyle (@IanDoyleSport) September 24, 2019
OPINION
Wow, these are big words from Lijnders. It must be incredibly difficult to come into first team training at Liverpool as a 16-year-old without being completely overawed by the likes of Virgil van Dijk, Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane. However, it certainly seems as if Elliott was able to do that without too many problems. For Lijnders to say that he plays like he is 28 or 29 years of age is a massive compliment. Elliott is still so young, and sometimes we are guilty of forgetting that. But he is obviously the Premier League’s youngest ever player for a reason, and that reason is that he’s a phenomenal talent. The fact that Lijnders says he sees so much around him before things happen is very exciting for the Reds faithful. That sounds as if they are going to be seeing a player mature beyond his years, who won’t be overawed by the big stage. Hopefully he features against MK Dons on Wednesday and we can all see what the fuss is about.
