Pundit Stephen Warnock has named the ‘one player’ who could potentially replace Mohamed Salah at Liverpool.
Speculation is rife over Salah’s long-term future at Anfield, after strong interest from the Saudi Pro League during the summer.
Al Ittihad eventually had an offer of around £150m turned down by Liverpool. And asked by Darren Bent on TalkSPORT whether he would sell the Egyptian for that kind of fee in the near future, former Red Warnock said there’d have to be someone lined up to replace Salah – and provided the man he thinks could do it.
“I wouldn’t sell him in this season, maybe next season but you’d have to have somebody lined up,” began the pundit.
“The one player who springs to mind is [Khvicha] Kvaratskhelia at Napoli.
“He’s the one player that you look at and think ‘young, potential, he can play’ but he’s a left-sided player, could he play on the right-hand side?
“[Dominik] Szoboszlai, that’s where he played at Leipzig, is he going to play higher up if he was to go? The scouting network will be out right now won’t it, knowing that Salah’s getting to that point.”
This time last year, not that many people were aware of the magical quality of Khvicha Kvaratskhelia. But fast-forward 12 months, and he’d perhaps walk into any team on the planet.
He may have tailed off a little towards the end of the campaign, but he was still a huge factor in Napoli’s first Scudetto win for 33 years.
12 goals and 10 assists in Serie A had everyone talking about ‘Kvaradona,’ and Europe’s traditional elite have all been linked – including Liverpool.
So far, Napoli have been determined to keep hold of the 22-year-old. There had been talk of an £87m fee being needed to lure him away from Southern Italy. Should Liverpool sell Salah though, stumping up that kind of money wouldn’t be an enormous problem.
If the Reds recruitment team – like Warnock – felt that Kvaratskhelia was the man to replace Mo, they’d surely happily pay it.
Traditionally though, Liverpool haven’t always gone for the most obvious option. And though as Warnock says, the Georgian is more of a left-sided right-footed winger, he would still be a fairly obvious, blockbuster signing.
If the Reds are convinced, then it wouldn’t be a surprise to see them go for Kvara as Salah’s potential successor. But we’d think a more natural replacement in the Pedro Neto-type mould might be a better bet for now.
