Liverpool are now ‘well placed’ to sign RB Leipzig defender Josko Gvardiol with the 21-year-old viewed as the ‘ideal partner’ for Virgil van Dijk, that’s according to Football Insider.
The Croatia international, who is also attracting interest from both Manchester clubs and Real Madrid, helped his nation reach the semi-final of the World Cup in Qatar in December and has been consistently good for the Bundesliga outfit this term.
Jurgen Klopp’s side have been linked with a number of central defenders recently with van Dijk now the wrong side of 30 and both Joel Matip and Joe Gomez struggling for form this season.
It now appears that our No. 4, alongside Ibou Konate, is Klopp’s preferred pairing at the heart of his defence and Gvardiol would certainly strengthen his options and be a long-term successor for the Netherlands captain.
The Leipzig man, who is believed to have a release clause of ‘close to £100m’ and was recently tipped to become ‘the best centre-back in the world one day’ by Owen Hargreaves (in comments relayed by the Express), has featured 32-times for his club this term with them currently fifth in the German top flight – one point outside the Champions League spots.
Admittedly, it is unlikely FSG will be willing to splash a huge amount of money on the Croatian as well as Jude Bellingham – the club’s ‘priority’ transfer target who will cost over £100m in the summer – but you never know.
If we’re to once again be competitive on all four fronts next season we need to complete some quality business this summer and securing Gvardiol’s signature could have a similar impact to the one van Dijk had at the club when he was signed from Southampton for £75m back in 2018.