He did spend two years in Austria, and he has a German manager, so I doubt he struggles too much with his German either.
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I think the club might think the opposite now, prioritize a forward instead of a midfielder. But it also depends if and when Mane leaves. Could be a long one, Thiago was also late in the wondow. If Keita stays and signs a new deal, Millie extending (although of course, he could also help cover the backup RB spot), Carvalho potentially has a good pre-season and competes between midfield and attack. I’m not 100% sure over the situation of Jones and Elliott, I mean, if we managed to sell Ox, we would still be left with 7 CM’s. So I don’t think it’s impossible that we don’t sign a midfielder this summer and leave going for someone like Bellingham in 2023. But of course, if Keita leaves, then it might happen. Both a midfielder and a forward. Could even be our only two (main) signings in this window.
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I’d rather go with our existing attackers minus Mane than go with our existing midfield as is next season.
Without Mane, we’d still have plenty of attacking threats. But in midfield we are a player or two down already. Yes, we have 7 in midfield, but they’re a mixture of injury prone and getting towards the end of their careers (only really Jones/Moton that are younger). I expect Naby to stay, but I expect much the same from him - plays really well, shows promise, picks up a niggle, and another, and another, we don’t see him for 2-3 months.
Diaz and Jota will get better, Carvallho for the future, and I’d be keen on Taki to stay too, assuming Bobby and Mo stick around.
Just to add - scoring goals is less of an issue for us than controlling midfield.
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This has been my take for a while, especially given the importance of the games Klopp in which was willing to use Elliott, but I think the CL final has made me take a step back on that. We went into that game with 2 injuries concerns in midfield and all of a sudden it felt like we didn’t have 8 CM options, but a core group of 4 plus 4 others we werent quite ready to consider for a game like this.
Numbers are important, but what City have shown is that a squad fewer in number can be stronger if there are fewer levels in their hierarchy. That has made me lean towards wanting a new CM who is of the level to challenge that core 4 even in the event that we ALSO have to replace Sadio.
I dont think it’s too much work to do in 1 summer to bring in a CM and new forward of the same sort of level of Diaz who then along with Carvhallo can be expected to replace Origi, Sadio, Ox and possibly Taki.
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Problem is that we are also down Origi and may lose Taki. Then next summer Mo and Bobby are out of contract. We need to strengthen up top for next season and for the future - unless we think Carvalho is going to come straight in and play and contribute as much Sadio. I doubt even his biggest admirers in the club think that is realistic in 22-23.
Edit: I think we need both a forward and a midfielder this summer
This is where we all agree! Ideally we bring in one of each, or Sadio signs a new deal and we focus on CM. Just seen that Jude is the most expensive England player right now - that’s who I want, but the price is worrying!
I think the club may be thinking along the same lines - the links to Tchouameni seem to show that we have gone quite far in trying to bring him in this summer.
Mane is never injured, fit as a fiddle, and he scores goals. That’s the hardest job in football, to actually stick it in the back of the net, consistently. He is a world class striker. These factors mean his value is high, either in staying here for another year, or to a new team if he is going elsewhere.
He is 30, has one year left, and wants to leave. Those factors take the price down. The price we heard, £42M/€50M, seems about right. If he is on the open market I’m certain we would get that, maybe more.
If he only wants one club, and they know that, we might not achieve the price we have set. At that point it becomes a straight choice between keeping him for another year, as he is under contract; or selling for a compromised fee - certainly more than the one Bayern have offered, but maybe closer to €40M.
I see merit in both sides of that, but once a player wants out, I would lean towards that outcome, provided we recruit a suitable replacement and don’t leave ourselves short.
I am convinced that is what is happening right now, behind the scenes, and we will know what’s what soon enough.
Edit:
If Bayern really are messing about on the fee, I would be happy if we signed Gnabry from them for a knock down price due to his own contract issues there.
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Next bid is 35 mil, plus 5 in add ons apparently
Signed for 34(35?) Mil and moved on for profit at 31 after winning everything. Not a bad deal for all involved.
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Hopefully the add ons are proper ones, not the guff Barca tried to use 
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I genuinely think that is about as high as we could reasonably expect to get without someone like PSG publicly pursuing him as well.
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If true, and if the add-ons are reasonably achievable, I could see us entertaining that offer.
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Balloon dior win…
It’s not only numbers, but suddenly we’d be left only with Bobby as the linking type of forward.
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In midfield we have a few older players and a few too young ones, if that makes sense. Keita is a little bit in between and there was a question mark what both parties want. It’s also why I’m not 100% sure Klopp sees (important) room for all 3 of: Jones, Elliott and Carvalho next season. Even if our plan is to use Carvalho in the forward area, sort of handing him Taki’s role. Could be that we go with almost the same midfield as this season, could be that during this summer we judge that we need a fresh reinforcement and let someone go out on loan.
I get your point, but think it would be really difficult to usefully loan out Jones or Elliott at this stage (not that there wouldnt be takers, but difficult from a faith/cohesion PoV) and Im not sure we can with Carvalho. So, maybe if there are 3 in the group in some what he same position that we’re a bit more conservative over it forces our hand on players like Ox and Taki to move them on to bring in a player more developed than those 3 who we expect to be competing for a CL final starting spot.
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I think some things might still change during pre-season. A player doing well, less well, maybe see a change of role for someone. There was obviously Millie’s situation which is now solved, the latest information on Keita is that the club hopes he signs a new deal, which obviously means we want to keep him. Ox, you’d hope we can attract a good enough offer with a year left, but there’s also not guarantee for that. We’re also willing to offload Taki. Klopp might feel we do need a CM signing and then simply go to our “weakest link” and find a solution for whoever that is. But I think there’s no doubt we’d have to bring a forward in if Mane leaves.
£30m up front and a max of £4m in add-ons still isn’t enough if you ask me. Maybe if they’d started there you could see it but starting at £21m and jumping another £9m in the space of 24 hours means there’s surely a bit more we can squeeze.
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This is bullshit! We hold all the cards here, Bayern can stump up some serious dollar or fuck off. That’s it. Entertaining £35m is a joke.
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Unfortunately we don’t. It is within our power to refuse to engage over anything that is happening now, but that still results in an outcome that is out of our hands.
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