The Mailbox takes issue with the assumption that the mood is good around West Ham. Also: Sadio Mane on his way; and plenty on Trent Alexander-Arnold’s anthem choices.
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What next for Liverpool’s front three
Agree with your article on Monday – The time is right for Mané to leave. It was always going to happen – age catches up with all of us and all that. Not that Mané is not performing, but having all 3 main(? – though Bobby is down the order now) over 30 means you need to refresh ASAP.
On the subject of the ongoing contract sagas though, I think Liverpool are in a really strong position to either get the cash for the player or see him leave on a free next summer. As with Salah, unfortunately.
A couple of things seem to put Liverpool in the driving seat for me. First, the season we just had means the money coming in to the club is historically high. I get the impression we don’t need to sell to buy as has a been the case previously – e.g. no way we buy Van Dijk without selling Coutinho. Or in some cases the cumulative money from selling fringe players.
The other is the investment in these players. It is known that Liverpool prefer to buy a player with resale potential. However, the initial investment in both Mané and Salah was ‘only’ ~£75-80m. And that was 5-6 years ago. The time for making big profit on both has passed. Personally I think Liverpool have found themselves in a situation where, for once, we can say – ok wind it down, we’ll take one more year on each of them rather than selling for around the same price as the purchase.
Sadly the time has come to break up the iconic trio, for me if Mané leaves now then great for him, he leaves an absolute legend and I expect him to pick up silverware for a few years yet. However, Liverpool are in a strong position to retain if the deal isn’t right and take their time to find a replacement. My predictions are always wrong, but I’m going…
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