It has been revealed who Liverpool will turn to after missing out on Moises Caciedo, while Tottenham are tempted to bid for Chelsea striker Romelu Lukaku, according to Tuesday’s European transfer gossip.
LIVERPOOL LOOK BACK TO KONE AND THURAM
Liverpool are still tracking Borussia Monchengladbach’s Manu Kone and Nice’s Khephren Thuram after missing out on Moises Caicedo, according to Fabrizio Romano.
Caicedo has completed his British record move from Brighton to Chelsea, despite Liverpool recently having a bid accepted for the Ecuador international. It means there is still a void to fill in defensive midfield for Jurgen Klopp’s side, especially with Southampton’s Romeo Lavia on his way to Chelsea too.
And Romano has now confirmed he is ‘sure’ that Liverpool are about to strengthen their midfield further – by turning back to two targets who were on their radar earlier this summer.
French pair Kouadio Kone and Thuram are the targets in question, with the former particularly one to keep an eye on after recovering from a recent injury (while the latter has previously been tipped to spend one more season at his current club).
Romano wrote for Caught Offside: “Liverpool will now move on to different targets. They keep following both Khephren Thuram and Manu Kone as they did earlier in the summer, but let’s see who they will ‘attack’ now.
“Of course they will try to limit leaks as it created an issue with the Caicedo deal and same with Lavia. It’s an open race for Liverpool in midfield, but for sure they will sign at least one new player in that position.”
Liverpool have already added Alexis Mac Allister and Dominik Szoboszlai to their midfield this summer. However, numerically, they are down on last season after the exits of Jordan Henderson, Fabinho, James Milner, Naby Keita, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Arthur Melo and Fabio Carvalho.
Neither Mac Allister nor Szoboszlai are a natural fit to replace Fabinho in the holding midfield role, even if the former did operate in that territory during their Premier League opener against Chelsea.
Last season, both Thuram and Kone played more frequently in box-to-box than holding midfield roles, but they did sometimes sit in the deeper position – especially Thuram.
Meanwhile, Romano has also revealed that Brighton will need to raise their €17m (£14.6m) offer to €30m (£25.8m) to sign Carlos Baleba from Lille as their Caicedo replacement.
