Few will feel inclined to complain too loudly about the current state of Liverpool’s midfield after the Reds spent upwards of £100m on a departmental reboot.
Dominik Szoboszlai, Alexis Mac Allister, Wataru Endo and Ryan Gravenberch came in through the door, though Jurgen Klopp’s men may kick themselves over the absence of Federico Valverde – a player the Anfield-based out has been linked with (GOAL) – knowing how cheaply they could have acquired him.
The former Penarol man (the same club Darwin Nunez left to make an initial switch to Almeria) has since signed a new contract at Real Madrid and will now set an interested party back to the jarring tune of £862.7m, as per his new release clause, as reported by Fabrizio Romano on X.
🚨⚪️ Real Madrid have agreed terms of Fede Valverde new deal — contract now ready until June 2028.
🔒 €1B release clause confirmed, as called by @tjcope. Agreement done.
Valverde, Camavinga, Vinicius Jr and all the other announcements will be made soon. pic.twitter.com/KzjtbjuuL1
— Fabrizio Romano (@FabrizioRomano) October 12, 2023
To think there was a time when Florentino Perez would have reportedly, according to the Daily Mail, sanctioned his release for £85m.
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Frustratingly, admirers like Liverpool could have snapped him up for a fraction of that figure in 2016 – £4.3m, to be precise – when Los Blancos wisely invested in the young player from the Uruguayan top-flight.
As we say, few can feel too aggrieved with a midfield that now contains the dynamic Dominik Szoboszlai, a World Cup winner in Alexis Mac Allister, an Ajax Academy graduate with an incredibly bright future in Ryan Gravenberch, not to mention a host of other talents we’re fortunate to have on our books.