Rumour Mongering: Liverpool Back In for £40 million Southampton Duo

Five players and £91.5m in just under 2 ½ years have been exchanged between Liverpool and Southampton, with all of the money heading down to the rainy south coast while all of the flights have made their way up to Liverpool John Lennon Airport. However, being that the lofty transfer fees have represented a sizeable chunk of the small club’s cash flow, while four of the five players involved are currently in Jürgen Klopp’s first choice XI for Liverpool, it can be argued that both parties have made out fairly well in this relationship thus far (Saints fan sentiment withstanding, of course).

So what better way to reinforce Most Favored Nation trading status than to keep on doing business? Rumours are that Klopp agrees with that sentiment and is of the mind to sanction £40m worth of transfer moves this winter window, which would represent nearly a 50% increase in the Red’s cumulative financial investment into the St. Mary’s coffers. Next up is starting center half Virgil van Dijk, who impressed either bigly or big league (depending on who you ask) in the 0-0 draw against Liverpool at the weekend, in addition to a move for young left back, Sam McQueen.

While the mobile Dutch center half talk is not new—demonstrated in Klopp’s clear preference for versatile, technical Dutch players such as rumoured target Quincy Promes and the positionally-flexible Gini Wijnaldum—the link to McQueen, a little-used backup, comes as a bit of a surprise. There has been some confusion around the Southampton native's contract situation, with some reports saying the 21-year old will be available on a free next summer while others claim that his current deal still has 18 months to run. But if James Milner is to remain the Red’s first choice at left back, then a move for an affordable but promising youngster to back the 30-year old up in the stead of the virtually exiled Alberto Moreno would appear to be a smart move.

Either way, Liverpool fans should be encouraged by the sensible and well thought out names coming out of the rumour mill of late.

Speaking of Saints transfers, while we at TLO are loathe to wilfully commit that journo sleight-of-hand of playing up the social media commentary of a handful of people as being representative of the opinion of a group in the main, we still admit to deriving some degree of enjoyment from the reaction of a selection o f Southampton fan Twitter this past summer when they thought we had wasted money on the now-bargain £30m Sadio Mané transfer. Enjoy:

The six-goal-and-two-assist-sized portion of schadenfreude goes down so, so smooth.