Liverpool has reportedly agreed an incredible deal to sign Alexis Mac Allister. Some more business is now needed to construct the perfect squad ahead of the preseason.
It’s no secret that Liverpool likes to get its business done early. Fabinho was announced shortly after defeat in the 2018 Champions League final, while a deal for Ibrahima Konaté was wrapped up in May of 2021. Alexis Mac Allister looks to be the next installment of that trend.
The full agreement has reportedly been reached over a deal before the Premier League transfer window even opens. According to Fabrizio Romano, the final fee Liverpool will pay is an astoundingly low $44m (£35m/€41m).
In striking the deal so promptly, Liverpool looks to have guaranteed that Jürgen Klopp will get a full pre-season with Mac Allister, allowing him to properly integrate the Argentine into his style of play. That process could well be important for the whole squad this summer, with the manager set to decide on what he wants his next great team to look like from a tactical standpoint.
To that end, the dream window would see Liverpool deliver the rest of its signings swiftly as well, with an ideal preseason scenario presenting itself. With players who are set to go on international duty due to link up with the squad on July 11, that’s the soft deadline for the Reds to conclude the bulk of their buying.
Mac Allister is the perfect start to the transfer window, but numerous other players would need to arrive to make it a genuinely elite summer. With Real Madrid have agreed on a fee for Jude Bellingham, the gamble is now starker than ever: whoever Liverpool signs must have a greater aggregate impact.
As such, more midfielders will be on the agenda. As good as Mac Allister is, he cannot single-handedly match Bellingham’s skill set Ideally, a more defensive presence would be added to the squad to replicate that side of the Englishman’s game — among the names linked to Liverpool, the best fit looks to be Roméo Lavia.
Posting colossal defensive numbers in an admittedly poor Southampton team, Lavia has attracted the attention of many big clubs. His 96th percentile blocking figures (midfielders in Europe’s top five leagues) would no doubt drop in a Liverpool side asked to absorb far less pressure, but his strong tackling and interception game should help prevent the transitions that undid the entire season for Klopp.
Joining Lavia and Mac Allister in midfield, Khéphren Thuram would give Liverpool the option of fielding a completely new central trio. More likely, the Frenchman would initially act as a rotation option, as would the Southampton starlet, but they would arrive with a clear medium-term pathway to becoming starters.
Rounding out this incredible summer would be a defender. The midfield needs such a reboot because Liverpool has been caught napping, and it is important to avoid a repeat further back. Virgil van Dijk and Joël Matip are both getting on in years, while question marks remain over Joe Gomez — if FSG wanted to make the ultimate show of intent, it would go out and get Joško Gvardiol.
That would be a very tough deal to get done, and there are some more realistic alternativethatho could still cap off a highly successful window. But Liverpool is ultimately shopping for the eventual long-term partner for Konaté, so it cannot do things by halves.
It remains to be seen how close Liverpool gets to this dream transfer window. But if most of those players are lining out when Klopp names his side to face Karlsruher SC on July 19, it will have been an incredible summer, one which Mac Allister looks to have already got underway.
