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Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp would be MAD to sign a new centre-back this summer - Carragher
LIVERPOOL boss Jurgen Klopp should avoid signing a centre-back in the summer transfer window.
That’s the verdict of Liverpool legend Jamie Carragher, who thinks Klopp would be “mad” to do so.
The Reds have recently been linked with Ajax centre-back Matthijs de Ligt, though it appears the 19-year-old is set to join Barcelona.
A portion of Liverpool fans have cried out for the club to chase Virgil van Dijk’s fellow Dutchman.
Van Dijk played all 38 of Liverpool’s Premier League games in 2018-19 as the only outfield ever-present in Klopp’s squad.
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But the injury history of back-up defenders Joe Gomez, Dejan Lovren and Joel Matip has been mentioned as a worry with all of the trio having missed substantial game-time over the last two seasons.
Gomez has only played 12 in the Premier League minutes since December 5 because of an ankle injury, having had similar issues last year while he has previously missed over a year of action with a torn cruciate ligament.
And given the niggles that Lovren and Matip have also succumbed to over recent campaigns, it has been felt that Liverpool would benefit by recruiting a fifth defender or by selling the much-maligned Lovren and replacing him with a defender with a cleaner bill of health.
Yet Carragher, a defender of 737 games’ experience at Anfield, argues otherwise and believes Liverpool’s current options are enough as it is.
I think you’d be mad now to sign one
But the Liverpool icon does admit that if a team were to make a sizeable offer for Lovren, he would consider moving the Croatian on.
“The form Matip’s been in, he’s been brilliant,” Carragher told The Anfield Wrap.
“At one stage three months ago I was thinking, ‘We need to buy a centre back.’
“You couldn’t trust Lovren or Gomez fitness-wise and Matip was the fourth choice and you’re thinking, ‘Is he good enough?’
“But I think you’d be mad now to sign one. Maybe if Lovren went, I don’t know his contract situation.
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“He’s far too injury prone for me so if someone made a good offer and you could buy someone without breaking the bank [you should sell him], because you’ve got Gomez there who was outstanding at the start of the season, you give him one more chance as well.
“Unfortunately for him [Lovren] he gets a lot of injuries and you can’t afford to have players in your squad who get injured all the time.
“It’s just not good. In Matip and Gomez we’ve got two excellent partners for big Virg.”
If Klopp keeps four centre backs, he occasionally looked to Fabinho to fill in at centre-back in 2018-19 and could do so again if engulfed in an injury crisis next season.
Academy talent Ki-Jana Hoever meanwhile established himself as an option for the campaigns to come after the 17-year-old’s impressive senior debut in an FA Cup defeat at Wolves back in January, when he was just 16.