Why Renato Sanches could emulate Mo Salah at Liverpool

Few within the Premier League would have touched Renato Sanches again in 2018 after his ill-fated mortgage transfer to Swansea.

Then simply 20, he seemed woefully out of his depth on the prime desk of English soccer, misplacing easy passes all around the store and failing to pressure his method right into a staff who, let’s face it, weren’t excellent.

However you do not play 35 occasions for Benfica and earn a £35m transfer to Bayern Munich earlier than your seventeenth birthday until there’s a participant in there someplace, nevertheless. And given time to work on his recreation exterior the expectant glare that comes at Europe’s elite golf equipment, Sanches has dug deep to search out it.

4 years on from the switch window that took him to the south coast of Wales, Sanches’ inventory has by no means been larger than it’s now. He is simply performed a central half in overthrowing Paris Saint-Germain’s longstanding dominance of Ligue 1, and Lille are making ready to money in on his startling rediscovery of his early potential this summer time.

Liverpool are the membership most heavily linked with a move for the 23-year-old, and that is no actual shock, contemplating they’ve a Georginio Wijnaldum-shaped gap to fill.

Sanches’ boundless vitality and stylish ball-retention abilities make him the best match, and if he’s accessible for round £45m as is being reported, then it might characterize some very good enterprise from Michael Edwards and co.

The truth that he as soon as failed at Swansea has inevitably been solid up as a giant crimson cross towards a possible deal, but it surely will not – and should not – issue into Liverpool’s considering.

It is a story the Reds have heard earlier than, in any case. Mohamed Salah was a Chelsea flop when he arrived from Roma, and 4 years on, he stands on 125 objectives for the membership – the twelfth most of any participant of their historical past.

Kevin De Bruyne confronted related criticisms when he first swapped the Premier League for the Bundesliga in 2014. Inside two years, he was again within the England with Man Metropolis, and he is now the very best midfielder on the planet.

You might go on all night time, however there is no must.

If you look previous one small blip on Sanches’ in any other case formidable profession trajectory, it is fairly clear he is precisely what Liverpool want this summer time. He is a hungry, upwardly cellular younger participant with prime stage expertise and resale worth; in different phrases, he’s precisely the kind of signing that Jurgen Klopp’s success at Anfield has been constructed on.

Towards that backdrop, the truth that he as soon as struggled as a child farmed out on mortgage to a struggling Premier League facet pales into insignificance.