Liverpool Line Up New Deals for Firmino and Woodburn

Emre Can is free to sign a pre-contract agreement with another club in less than three months, but according to reports today he’s not anywhere near to a new Liverpool deal. Instead it’s Roberto Firmino and Ben Woodburn who are next in line on the contract renewal front.

Woodburn is the more straightforward case, with the young winger expected to put pen to paper on a long-term deal when he turns 18 later in the month, and by all accounts Liverpool and Jürgen Klopp see the youngster as a player who will turn into a star in the coming years.

Firmino, meanwhile, has a contract that runs through 2020—but he also has a reported £82M release clause and is on £100k per week. The club would like to get rid of, or at the very least raise, the former and are happy to give Firmino a significant raise when it comes to the latter.

In his case, then, a new deal would be meant both to reward him for becoming one of Jürgen Klopp’s best and most important players and to either eliminate the release clause if possible and, if not, to at least bring it more into line with the ever-inflating football transfer market.

With Firmino turning 26 this week, it’s also a contract that could ensure the player’s prime years are spent at Anfield, making it far more difficult for him to be poached by a big continental side than it currently with two-and-a-half years to run and a reasonable release clause.

For Woodburn, meanwhile, it’s an investment in the future, and though his minutes have been limited so far this season, the expectation remains that he will play a not insignificant role before it’s done and will become a regular contributor perhaps as soon as next year.