Liverpool banter 7

06 Jun 2026 20:56:29
Khephren Thurman Juve 6ft 3ish. Father and bro both good players. Played for France. Played with Manu Kone 6ft1 Ish. Under 21 French Olympic team. Both played with Hugo. We was linked to both; however Kone got injured after the U21Euros. I think both box to box. Kone likes a tackle, more of a no6.

Pocketed Bellingham when they both played in Germany. Kone for me would fit well and has a high potential. Also was a Liverpool fan when he was a kid. Kone posted highest km covered in both German and Italian league. I think I’m old and memory not good
Replying to

06 Jun 2026 23:21:18
Luka Vuskovic possibly looking for a move if Spurs buy 2 starting CB's.

07 Jun 2026 00:46:28
I'd be all over Vuskovic.

07 Jun 2026 01:42:46
He must be a real looker, so Florian.

07 Jun 2026 09:58:44
What makes Vuskovic so special? Never seen him playing myself, so I have zero opinion.

07 Jun 2026 12:05:38
He's very highly rated Shanks, Spurs signed him as a 16 year old I believe, but just coming into the squad now that he's 18.

Not sure we really want another teenage CB who will be looking for starter minutes though, with Leoni, Jacquet, and the Austrian lad.

06 Jun 2026 22:18:22
LFC have Rio and Abe ready or coming in 3 years max amongst other elite youth talents.

Edwards and co believe they are ahead of the curve and the smartest people in any room!

Knowing what we have in Rio and the academy there would be no harm in buying quality veterans like Mitoma and or Bowen.

06 Jun 2026 22:35:52
I see Rio got on the pitch for the 2nd half of the friendly. First full cap at 17. I can see how we really should be looking to get rid.

06 Jun 2026 22:58:32
You can't rush young players through, especially if they depend on pace. So many careers have been shortened for that reason.

The idea with all the youth is that if even 10% make it through, which is a push, it will create something we have been sorely missing for a long time.



Abe and Rio will have to make do with either the cups and sub roles and or loans for a few years yet.

I reckon the Austrian CB is the most likely to power through the ranks quickly, and also believe that there will likely be 1/2 surprise breakthrough players because Andoni is on it.

06 Jun 2026 23:08:49
What difference would it make Rio getting 1000 minutes with the first team at 17 or playing 2000 plus minutes, starting week in week out for under 21's and 18's? Surely, his body would still be covering a similar distance and doing similar amounts of twists, turns and sprints.

06 Jun 2026 23:29:14
@FSW, I agree with what you are saying about not taking any unnecessary risks with youngsters, especially those whose key capability is pace, but I honestly think that there is no 'one rule fits all'. Some youngsters are capable of playing at a higher level than most for their age. I actually think Rio doesn't rely on explosive pace - at the moment, his most prominent capability is his footwork, rather than speed.

As I say, he's by absolutely no means the finished article and I'm not advocating that he's an automatic starter for our games, but I think that he has the capacity to play in a fair amount of games this coming season.

06 Jun 2026 23:08:48
If you're the smartest person in the room, you're in the wrong room.

07 Jun 2026 06:50:53
Rio will get a lot more minutes next season than last. Ability wise, he is ready, but his body probably needs time to build up to the demands. My only criticism of him last season was his propensity to switch off when he lost the ball or didn't have it. Iraola is the perfect coach to improve that.

06 Jun 2026 22:17:56
No Liverpool player in the England squad since 1986. Rio on playing as a rw.

06 Jun 2026 23:02:04
No Liverpool player in the England squad since 1986?

I can think of a few.

06 Jun 2026 23:57:46
Sorry I meant to say it's the first time since 1986 that no Liverpool players are in the England team.

07 Jun 2026 00:40:15
1st time there are no Liverpool players in England's World Cup squad since 1986 is what I think you mean, Keegans Purm. 🤔

07 Jun 2026 02:54:55
You're in the wrong room @Robbo.

07 Jun 2026 07:27:01
I thought Rio did well last night in a stale and boring game. For all those who think we should be selling Rio to the likes of Bayern, give the lad a chance. He's 17 and doesn't need to be a world beater yet, even if he's just played for England.
Let's just enjoy seeing how he develops.

07 Jun 2026 11:30:41
I just disregard such talk. Some fans are always playing "Football Manager" or "Monopoly".

06 Jun 2026 21:09:15
Hey Eds, what does our homegrown quota look like?
Do we have to buy more home grown players?

{Ed001's Note - there is no such thing as a home grown quota.}

06 Jun 2026 22:49:52
Premier League clubs must include a minimum of 8 homegrown players in their official 25-man squad lists.

{Ed001's Note - that is not correct. It is that you have 8 spaces that can only be taken by homegrown players. There is no requirement to utilise the spaces, you just have to run with a smaller squad.}

06 Jun 2026 22:54:50
8 home grown players, or enough spaces to make it up to 8, mate.

So if we had 5, we could submit a squad of 22 and still be fine and dandy.

06 Jun 2026 22:10:14
There are so many posts about this player is rubbish or this suspected target is overpriced. It seems everyone is an expert, including me. We quite easily could justify signing a new keeper, defenders, midfielders and forwards.

So a question just to see what everyone is thinking. Name one player for each of these roles we should sign. Keep it realistic i.e. no Mbappe or Yamal. So one GK, Def, Mid and Forward.

06 Jun 2026 22:14:48
Resign Woodman for another year.
Zabarnyi, if on loan or a good fee.
Scott for midfield.
Diomande for forward.

06 Jun 2026 22:22:13
Going to be a pain here, KD, and say I don't want to see us buying loads of new players in the summer.
We definitely need a right back who is durable - so my D is Palestra.

I don't think we need a keeper.
I want to see what Andoni can get out of our current midfielders, including our fringe players and our younger players (Jones, Elliott, Nyoni, McConnell).

Dom and Grav, when on form, are perfectly capable of being our first choice midfield.
In terms of forwards, to replace Salah, I'd like to see us go for Rayan.

So Palestra RB and Rayan RW, then see what Iraola can get out of the current squad.

06 Jun 2026 22:29:08
I agree with R K, other than I think we also need a new player to fill the number 6 role / share it with Grav.

06 Jun 2026 22:48:40
GK - Khelleher
Def - Palestra.
Mid - Really hard, just naming one, but my ideal one is Elliot of Forrest.
For - Diomande. If not, Rayan.

06 Jun 2026 23:12:59
GK - Robin Roefs
Def - Kayode
Mids - Camara + Scott
Forwards - Diomande + leftfield/unexpected.

06 Jun 2026 23:30:18
GK - Robin Roefs
Def - Kayode
Mids - Camara and Sadiki
Forwards - Diomande and B. Toure.

06 Jun 2026 19:49:34
Away from transfers

Federico Chiesa

As much as I don’t think the lad is the answer for us.
Upon Andoni being announced, his style of play is in my opinion tailor made to Chiesa's strengths and if he stays beyond this window I genuinely believe we will see an improved and better version of what we have up to now. Again can’t stress I don’t think he’s the answer and long term plan but he can definitely be a great squad/ team option for us and will have a greater impact on the team.

I also feel the same about Curtis Jones aswell but again not the answer but we can give him more time and we will get better performances out of him with this style of play.

06 Jun 2026 20:43:20
I don't see how Iraola's style is tailor made for Chiesa, mate.

I don't think Chiesa's body is capable of high intensity football or back to back games.

Last season, when he featured on a weekend quite a few times, he missed the midweek game that followed due to niggles or illness, and he's pulled himself out of quite a few international call ups sighting fitness.



But surely if it's match fitness then playing those games will help.

06 Jun 2026 21:06:04
Ffs, when is this Chiesa nonsense going to stop? Are you stuck in a time warp in 2020, before Chiesa had his injury. He is not that same player anymore. It wasn't Slot that had anything against him. He is just not good enough or physically fit enough for Liverpool, or any Premier League team for that matter. He will be sold in this window.

06 Jun 2026 21:23:28
JK, I fear a lot of our players' bodies may be incapable of Iraola's 7 day week training after last season's approach/style/stats/fitness etc... I sense the medical team gonna be busy... hope I'm totally wrong, of course, but it kinda concerns me. ✌

06 Jun 2026 21:24:29
I agree, Kemlyn.

06 Jun 2026 21:24:59
@Kemlyn

No doubt, he might go this window as his Liverpool career to date has not been great. I agree, but he should have been given more game time to try to get some kind of form and rhythm.

As I was trying to point out, I don't think he should be a starter week in, week out, but believe he has more to offer under Iraola's tactics and playing style that suits his natural game.



Ffs, did you not understand it was an opinion, and in turn it's nice to find out other people's opinions.

06 Jun 2026 21:35:03
I agree too, Kemlyn.

06 Jun 2026 21:39:25
Gomez has been 3 seasons on the physio table, yet so many here want him staying ???

06 Jun 2026 22:02:48
I think the issue with Chiesa is that he never gets a consistent run in the team, and when he does get played, it's either a cup game with a second string attack, or he only comes on the dying embers of a game that we are already struggling in.

I feel it happens a lot when you try to bed in a player who maybe isn't suited to the style or has been injured/lacking confidence, they get put in second string teams and never build up any rapport on the pitch with their teammates as they are constantly changing.



Always feel bad for a player when they are in and out of the team and never playing with the same lads each time, must be hard to get in sync (I know they are professionals), but at the end of the day it must be hard to keep any rhythm.

06 Jun 2026 22:13:50
Again, he's here. What's the use letting go, we're short of forwards atm, we'd only have to replace him.

06 Jun 2026 22:26:20
Pointless talking about his physical capacity given what we know now about Peeters' conditioning regime.

If Iraola wants him to stay, the new physical performance people are in, and he wants to give it one more year, I'd be cool with that. The squad needs numbers.

06 Jun 2026 22:28:39
Dhfc
I know it is all about opinions, but what exactly in the 9 games Chiesa has started makes you think he is good enough for Liverpool? The one thing we absolutely can't do is give an extended run in the team, in the deluded hope that he might get up to speed. It is for the same reason Liverpool can't put in young untried players from other countries, as teams like Brighton, Bournemouth, and Brentford would do.

Teams like that don't have the expectations of needing to win every game, as Liverpool do. Chiesa's physical fitness is so bad that Gattuso sent him straight back home from the World Cup squad. I would put money on him never playing for Liverpool or Italy again.

06 Jun 2026 22:44:17
Fair play @Kemlyn, so your issue is more that it’s his fitness that won’t allow it, which I agree with to a certain extent, but like some of the other posters have said, our whole fitness has dwindled under Slot, so my opinion is that if he could get himself fit and stay fit to put a run of games in, he could have a lot more of an impact for us than he has.

I understand it’s a lot of ifs.
Maybe I’m just a football romantic and really like the lad and want it to work out. I was the same with Nunez.
I do see your point, it’s all fitness. If he could overcome that, he would be a good squad edition, I believe.

06 Jun 2026 22:47:18
I agree, @Kemlyn. I thought that buying him was a good piece of business - a snip at £10m. He was always going to be either an excellent buy for the money paid to someone who wouldn't get anywhere near his pre-injury best.

Sadly it has been the latter. It doesn't seem to be for the want of trying and he seems like a really decent bloke but it just hasn't worked out on the pitch.

His body just doesn't seem to be up to the rigour of playing a decent number of games, let alone 40 or 50 plus.

I think it's a shame that we didn't get the chance to see him playing at the level he had reached before the injury. Given it's a business I expect him to be moved on if anybody makes an offer. If he does leave, I would wish him the very best of luck wherever he goes.

06 Jun 2026 23:01:06
Dhfc,
I agree that Chiesa seems to be a nice lad and has integrated well into the squad. Same with Endo. I have nothing personal against him. In 2020, we wouldn't have been able to prise him away from Juventus for £100m, so there is a reason we got him for £12m. I imagine we will sign two wingers this summer, potentially Dionande and Barcola.

To give Chiesa a run, you would have to leave out one of those two, Isak or even Ekitike, when he's fit. While we wait for Chiesa to get to a level he is probably never going to achieve, we could be out of contention for the title. Of course, he could try really smashing it in training and catch Iraola's eye, but I doubt it. YNWA.

07 Jun 2026 06:46:18
He's a fringe player, no-one expects 70 games a season from him.
His wages are high for a fringe player.

I trust Andoni to evaluate the squad and the youth players. Perhaps Chiesa will obstruct a young player coming through.

Whatever happens, he's always tried 100% for us and I thank him for that.

07 Jun 2026 12:11:15
I loved Chiesa and Barella in that 2020 Italy team. But that's 6 long years ago - more than half of most footballing careers. I like his enthusiasm, but at 200k per week, I'd have a serious look at giving someone else, with considerable potential, half of that.

06 Jun 2026 18:53:46
Am I alone in being underwhelmed at the prospect of LFC signing Yan Diomande £100m+?

Clearly a talent boy but for the money quoted I would want a polished talent like Khvicha Kvaratskhelia!

06 Jun 2026 19:01:42
The money is steep and he is so young, but he reminds me so much of Mane. He looks intense, quick, strong, good with both feet and just a general menace for defenders. Therefore I am very excited about the prospect of signing him.

06 Jun 2026 19:02:05
Khvicha certainly wasn't polished at 19. And who says it'll be a £100m+? I think it will be EUR100m max.

06 Jun 2026 19:24:31
I don't care about the money. The club know what they can and can't afford, they know whether they think a player is worth a certain amount of money or not.

06 Jun 2026 19:26:56
I agree, for that money get an established winger, Diamande has only had one good season. He might be great, but can't take a £80 mill gamble.

06 Jun 2026 19:27:18
It's not our money, so don't worry about it, mate.

06 Jun 2026 19:42:42
See if he actually costs that much first.
He might have a nice release clause or something.

06 Jun 2026 20:07:01
Who are these established wingers that we could actually get out of their clubs?

06 Jun 2026 20:15:59
@SA, Isak at £120m suggests Richard Hughes is like a chubby kid in a sweet shop! LFC are moving away from what made them successful = model professionals like Milner, Lallana, combined with hungry attacking players like Salah, Bobby, Mane, Diaz and Jota before they were expensive superstars!

06 Jun 2026 20:22:13
So Florian, is there only 1 winger who is a gamble for the price of 80mill as quoted everywhere?

06 Jun 2026 20:39:24
The talent pool available is more of a puddle and Diomande is one of the best and most realistic options. It's an impressive break out season regardless of anything else and he's better than the likes of Minteh, Nusa, Trincao, Rodrygo etc., who are all very underwhelming, to say the least. I have to agree with Florian in saying, who are these so called "established wingers"?

06 Jun 2026 20:50:51
I guess I'm agreeing with what Victor says above. If he comes in for £85m and does a good job for a few years and is sold off for a profit, or better still stays a decade, it's a bargain. And there is not a lot of wingers I can think of that I'd actually prefer.

06 Jun 2026 21:07:25
Diogo, I couldn't agree more. The Liverpool way has been left behind. I don't mind bringing in the odd big money signing when necessary. Alisson and Virgil, for example, were key to our success, but we were way off the mark last summer. Unfortunately, it's a real 'name your price' market at the moment.

Not a whole lot of talent out there. It almost seems like 100m is the going rate for anybody who's had a really good season. Diomande is the best option at the moment, unfortunately, that comes at a price. I don't actually believe he'll cost 100m. I think we can get a deal done at 80m.

06 Jun 2026 21:22:17
For me, LFC could have bought Rayan or Estevao directly!

19-year-old El Mala from Koln and/or 21-year-old Fernandez-Pardo from Lille, for example.

This squad doesn't need minor tweaks, it needs 5 or 6 players!

06 Jun 2026 21:27:53
Didn't the club buy Darwin for 86 mill and Szob and Naby for 60 mill some seasons ago.

I think the only difference last season was we broke the 100 mill barrier twice. But, with inflation, transfers are always going up, and have done since the game went professional.

06 Jun 2026 21:32:27
I get what you're saying, Chewy, but has the Liverpool way not been to always bring in the best player possible? The fanbase feel burnt by last summer, but that shouldn't mean we shouldn't go for expensive players as long as they are the right player.

Kenny, Virg, Alli were all record buys. I believe he's our best option, and like you, I believe we'll get him for about 80m if it happens. Do people think the likes of Minteh or Rayan are gonna cost much less?

06 Jun 2026 21:32:48
He's only 19, yes it's insane money, but also he's only 19, already putting in great numbers other than goals and assist, like take ons and dribbling success, which is what we need currently, and if we can add goals and assists to his already impressive work rate, we could have a great player on our hands.



Certainly has all the attributes to be a great player, only time will tell.

06 Jun 2026 22:30:58
@His Name, we spent £75m on a defender from Southampton, who many people said wasn't great and was a waste of money. We spent £80m on Nunez, £60m on Szob, and that was before Hughes.

Big fees are the way the world is going. The moment a player has a good season, bang whack on £80m. Leipzig want to keep him, bang whack on £100m.

It's just the way it is.

I imagine the owners have given them a budget and they are spending it.



Yeah, you can go on about why didn't we sign Rayan or Scott directly, but would they have had the opportunities with us they had at Bournemouth. No, they would have sat on the bench or gone into u21s. They are the players they are because they had the opportunity to play.

They are the players we want because of what they did at Bournemouth.

06 Jun 2026 23:03:56
@SA,

Rayan would have played 15 - 20 had LFC signed him for 35 - 40m direct from Brazil last summer!

Virgil was clearly the best centre back in the Premier League when LFC signed him, and they overpaid because we nearly messed up the deal!

06 Jun 2026 23:39:58
Ba, spot on. Liverpool are expected to win every game and can't afford many slip-ups if they are to challenge for the major trophies. Young untried players get more chance to develop at clubs like Brighton, Bournemouth, and Brentford, where the expectations are not so high.

07 Jun 2026 02:25:59
Florian, I see your point, and I'm not saying we shouldn't move for expensive players; personally, I get frustrated hearing we're keen on 'so and so' only for us to do nothing but 'keep tabs' for 2 years, watch them go elsewhere and quadruple in value, Olise & Semenyo, for example.

I think we've always tried to find a bargain, not for being cheap, but to find value in rising talent at the right time, and, at the same time, we haven't shied away from big signings if we felt they were the right move.

Salah, Alonso, Firmino, Coutinho, Robbo etc... all brought in for a pittance, really. Even Suarez and Torres were bought for less than half of what we sold them for.

07 Jun 2026 02:57:08
Was the £100m+ figure taken from social media @OP?

07 Jun 2026 06:48:56
I'm wary of overpaying for players from the Bundesliga.

06 Jun 2026 18:34:48
For the sale of Macca I’d get Manu Kone 50m euro transfer market or 38 mEuro Thurman or both and throw in Fede to Juve and still have change at least two players that can tackle progress the ball and are younger. 🤔

06 Jun 2026 18:56:35
Bauldy, who does Thurman play for? I'll look up his stats.

06 Jun 2026 19:27:33
Thuram, maybe?

06 Jun 2026 20:32:59
Does Lilian fancy coming out of retirement to play CB?

06 Jun 2026 22:27:39
Mamadou Sangare would be a better option now and can offer the same attributes. Manu Kone has a patchy injury record.

06 Jun 2026 17:56:50.
Two transfers, I have never understood:

Kevin Keegan to Hamburg - Surely he could have chosen any top club in Europe, so why Hamburg? Sure, The Beatles had got their groove there, but it was a bombed out city at the time.

Graeme Souness - Sampdoria. Again, not exactly a top tier club at the time.

And Genoa was another European port city horribly damaged from WW2.

In both cases, they clearly were not moving for the better surroundings, but also to teams who were not Tier 1 European clubs.

Can any of the older posters explain this one?

06 Jun 2026 18:24:35
The Land Rover incident.

06 Jun 2026 18:32:43
Not an older poster but the football landscape was massively different then. Hamburg were regular league winners back then and the equivalent of Bayern now, he played in a UCL final with them and they won it not long after they left. Sampdoria slightly different, but they were still a good side.

Add in the fact only the champion qualified for the Champions League and football was a lot more competitive back then, there was no elite handful of clubs who controlled the game. Obviously you still had the super clubs like us, Ajax etc, but it was a lot more competitive. Hence why you got Champions League winners from the likes of Romania and Serbia.

Arguably it was too far the other way back then, but I'd make a case football peaked when you had the top 2 or 3 teams qualifying for the Champions League and the Cup Winners Cup existed.

Loads of movement amongst the top teams and it was unpredictable.

There were about 10+ teams who could realistically win the European Cup/Champions League every year and if a world class player came available you would have about 15/20 teams trying to sign him. Nowadays it's about 5 clubs around Europe if that, and the only way to break the monopoly is to have some mad dictator buy your club. Even then with FFP it's unlikely (can't see Newcastle challenging anytime soon).

Feel I've gone off on a tangent here but the basic point is Hamburg were a top club for a few years, just like many others. Don't forget Keegan won the Ballon d'Or while he was there.

06 Jun 2026 18:35:42
Monster, Keegan was on about 22k at Liverpool. He moved to Hamburg for about 5 x that amount. He was made the highest paid player in Germany. Taxation over there was also a lot more favourable.



They won the Cup Winners Cup in 1977 and the Bundesliga in 78/79. They went on to win the European Cup in 82/83. They were no mugs, back in the day.

06 Jun 2026 18:31:23
They moved to these places 30-40 years after the war. How long do you think it took to rebuild these cities?

06 Jun 2026 18:56:20
Souness went to Sampdoria to play against the best players in the world and multiply his salary many times over.

06 Jun 2026 19:17:29
Cookie, even in the 80s, London still had bombed out wasteland - usually bought up by NCP for parking plots. Germany was rebuilt, not immediately - but it is striking to walk around places like Munich, and see how they rebuilt the old buildings brick by brick. Not so in the UK.

A city takes a long time to recover from bombardment. In my view, Liverpool in particular was ill-served by the post war years.

One of the most beautiful cities in the UK (it was at that time equal to Edinburgh). It was devastated by cheap attempts to rebuild it after WW2. We took on the disastrous US model of driving dual carriageways between communities - isolating, and reinforcing, the poor from the rich.

So, yes, places like Genoa and Hamburg were still struggling from being blown to pieces just 30 or so years on. These were awful times.

06 Jun 2026 19:27:50
Hamburg were a top club at the time n was flush with money.

06 Jun 2026 19:55:26
Did he not win the Ballon d'Or twice back then so can't have been that bad?

06 Jun 2026 20:28:18
I was working near Hamburg when Keegan was there. He was idolised.
Everywhere we went it was Keegan this, Keegan that, they loved him. They had him up there with George Best.

06 Jun 2026 21:09:29
I used to love watching Hamburg and Sampdoria with Keegan and Souness on the Fire Stick and YouTube back in the 70's/80's.

Massive fan of those clubs back then.

06 Jun 2026 21:37:32
I love how the past can be rewritten. The UCL in the 70s and 80s? Teams from Serbia winning the UCL?

06 Jun 2026 22:19:00
We've still got a bombed out church in Liverpool.

06 Jun 2026 22:24:34
StEtienne, I think the Serbia reference was regarding Red Star Belgrade.

07 Jun 2026 21:45:01
The UCL and the European Cup are exactly the same tournament, St Ettiene. Red Star won it. Not rocket science.