Liverpool have accepted our pursuit of Virgil van Dijk has failed and have instead turned our attention to alternative targets, claims Emanuele Giulianelli in the Sport Review.
He claims, in no uncertain terms, that Liverpool have had an opening £36.7m bid for Napoli’s towering centre-back Kalidou Koulibaly rejected.
The 26-year-old Senegal international is one of the best centre-backs in Serie A and prides himself on his monstrous physicality – standing at 6ft. 5′.
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However, Giulianelli is notoriously unreliable and until this news is confirmed by a more respected source, we’re assuming it’s bogus.
At the moment, Liverpool are tying up the Mo Salah deal and we reckon will only move onto prospective new centre-backs once it’s over the line.
Publicly, we’ve pulled out of the race for Van Dijk, but many believe we’ll try again towards the end of the summer, considering the Dutchman is Jurgen Klopp’s primary target and the player wants to come.
He’ll likely have to alert Southampton of his intention to leave if we’re to stand a chance of resurrecting the botched transfer, however.