Your Transfer Rumor is Bullshit: Joel Matip to Fulham

Yesterday, James Pearce of The Echo made a definitive claim about Liverpool’s upcoming transfer window plans, or rather lack thereof. According to the well-connected and trustworthy journalist, Liverpool are not planning on making any moves for any personnel in the upcoming transfer window.

As such, it’s not a cognitive leap to think that Jurgen Klopp would not be keen on allowing Liverpool players to leave during said window. This has to be doubly true for experienced, senior players who are not too far down the pecking order.

So, the report that Joel Matip would leave in the winter has to be taken with a rather large grain of salt. And when said report comes from Turkish publication A Spor, claiming to have an inside scoop into new Fulham manager Claudio Ranieri’s winter transfer plans, we are firmly into “bullshit” territory.

The report, for what it’s worth, claims that Turkish club Fenerbahçe is in for Matip, but gosh darn it, Ranieri is planning on swooping in on the deal in order to strengthen Fulham’s leaky defense. Relying on Matip to improve your defense? Bold strategy.

Although Matip has not been an integral part of this Liverpool side (apart from Klopp’s continued and frustrating insistence on bringing him in with a narrow lead late in games), it’s easy to imagine a situation where he would be, especially given the less-than-stellar injury records of Joe Gomez and Dejan Lovren.

As the fourth-choice center-back (with only youth players behind him), it would be negligent of Klopp to allow him to leave mid-campaign. I think we can safely toss this transfer rumor into the bin.