Fabrizio Romano hints that Liverpool’s transfer stance could change as injury crisis heightens

Fabrizio Romano has hinted that Liverpool could alter their January transfer stance in the wake of the latest injury blow to Arne Slot’s squad.

The Reds went into last night’s match against Qarabag without three senior defenders in Giovanni Leoni, Conor Bradley and Joe Gomez (the former two are sidelined for the rest of the season), and Jeremie Frimpong pulled up with a suspected hamstring problem inside the first five minutes.

When the head coach was asked in his post-match press conference whether he’d consider a short-term signing or a loan before Monday’s transfer deadline, his response suggested that the club wouldn’t make any knee-jerk decisions based on recent injury setbacks.

Romano: Liverpool ‘could enter the market’ for a right-back

However, in an update on his eponymous YouTube channel in the early hours of Thursday morning, Romano indicated that Liverpool might yet enter the market for a right-back in the coming days, depending on the projected timeline for Frimpong’s body blow.

The Italian said: “At the moment what I can tell you is that Liverpool already assessed potential options at right-back when Conor Bradley suffered his injury against Arsenal, and at that time Liverpool felt in the market there were no good right-backs to sign in this January transfer window.

“This is why they decided not to proceed with any of these players and didn’t open any concrete negotiations for a right-back in January. Now, after Jeremie Frimpong’s injury, let’s see. If Liverpool find a good solution, they could enter the market.

“They were already assessing the right-back market in this window and considered that there was no Liverpool-level player available on the market. Now the emergency is different, of course. Let’s see how long Frimpong will be out, but that’s for sure a point to consider.”

Liverpool are down to the bare bones at the back

If the Netherlands international is expected to be out for only a brief period, LFC might decide against signing another right-back when they already have three at the club, in the belief that it wouldn’t make sense in the longer-term.

However, if our number 30 – who’s already missed more than two months of the season with separate hamstring injuries – is to be sidelined for a lengthy period, it’d be negligible in the extreme from Liverpool to not at least consider bringing in a replacement, even if it’s just until the summer.

At present, Slot’s choices for the right-back berth are Calvin Ramsay – who’s shown glimpses of his talent but is inexperienced at senior level – or a midfielder being forced to play out of position, as Dominik Szoboszlai, Curtis Jones and Wataru Endo have all done in recent months.

That might be manageable for a couple of matches, but simply isn’t sustainable from now until the end of the campaign, and Frimpong’s injury has come at a time when FSG have only four days to act before the transfer window shuts until the summer.

Logic would suggest that Liverpool must throw everything at trying to sign a versatile defender before Monday’s deadline, but the reality is obviously more difficult, especially when prospective sellers know how desperate our situation is and have the power to charge through the nose for their players.

This is a big, big week for Richard Hughes, to put it mildly.

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