With Liverpool manager Arne Slot achieving the almost unthinkable in his first season in charge at Anfield and leading the club to its 20th top flight title, it was always set to be a pretty busy summer when it came to transfer window wheeling and dealing.
Our 46 year old gaffer hit the ground running as we quickly replaced the departing Trent Alexander-Arnold with incredibly highly rated Bayer Leverkusen fullback Jeremie Frimpong, and we have long been linked with having a potential £116 million interest in his former teammate, Florian Wirtz. In the last week rumblings of an interest in Bournemouth left back Mils Kerkez really stepped up a notch and on Friday evening reports started to come through that we had now in fact struck a £40 million deal with them for his services. Even for those who enjoy online games and gamble with ethereum, this was a punt that very few would have seen coming.
The 21 year old Hungarian international only moved to the Premier League two years ago, coming in for an undisclosed fee from AZ Alkmaar, but he now has 60 top flight starts to his name and he had been impressing plenty in the wider world of football, so whilst it is no surprise to see him move on this summer, it is a huge show of faith in the youngster from Slot and the club, particularly at that price tag.
For a player of his age, the Serbian born talent has moved around a fair bit. Beginning his career at Hungarian side Gyor, he made the move to Serie A to join Italian side AC Milan but having failed to make his breakthrough with them he switch to Dutch Eredivisie side Alkmaar in the January of 2022. Having impressed with them, helping the side to a fourth place finish in the Dutch top flight and to the semi finals of the 2022/23 Europa Conference League, Bournemouth jumped quickly that summer having seen his potential.
Somewhat ironically, Liverpool sporting director Richard Hughes was working for the Cherries at the time, so we have clearly done our due diligence on him behind the scenes here, and fans themselves can make their own judgements having seen him play all 38 league games for them last term, and as we know Bournemouth finished in ninth place in the table with the help of two goals and an additional six assists from him.
With 23 caps for his country, he now teams up with international colleague Dominik Szoboszlai at Anfield, but there will certainly be those in the Liverpool faithful who are looking ahead and considering what it means for our existing options on the left side of defence.
Many would definitely now expect Kostas Tsimikas to move on, although at this stage a potential destination is still very much unknown. However, the future of Scottish international Andy Robertson is more concerning. The 31 year old is the undoubted Number 1 for the position, and an educated guess would say that we have not paid £40 million for a player who would be happy to remain as a back up for too long. Robertson has already been linked with a move to Atletico Madrid this summer, so that could be one to watch moving forward.
Image Source: unsplash.com
