Jude Bellingham is a name that continues to be linked with a switch to Liverpool.
A midfielder who has already been the subject of a £25m transfer, who has international recognition from England and has featured a a major tournament, who has lit up the Bundesliga with Borussia Dortmund...and is still only 18.
The hype has been real up to now on Bellingham, who departed for Germany from Championship side Birmingham City in the summer of 2020. The next test for him will undoubtedly arrive when he makes his Premier League bow, but quite when that will happen remains to be seen.
He has suitors, Liverpool among them, with Reds legend Jamie Carragher even stating his belief that he is a player that owners Fenway Sports Group should be looking to add to the Reds. He is a player who has all the attributes to be world class and who has time on his side, and that kind of profile would likely make FSG more willing to hand boss Jurgen Klopp a transfer kitty to land the midfielder this summer. Dortmund are wanting to keep hold of their midfield maestro, however.
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With a transfer value of between £90m and £110m according to the analysts at the CIES Football Observatory in Switzerland, who analyse a wide range of factors when determining transfer value in the current marketplace, Bellingham would be an expensive piece of transfer business for the Reds.
It would involve them breaking their own transfer record, one set in 2018 with the addition of the transformational Virgil van Dijk from Southampton. It is, though, a sign of the times. While the transfer dealings may have slowed due to the pandemic the values have continued to rise for the top players, something evidenced by Manchester City's £100m purchase of Aston Villa's Jack Grealish last summer.
FSG aren't notoriously free spending in the transfer window, much to the chagrin of some Reds fans. Their spend previously has been offset considerably by outgoings, as was the case with the £142m exit of Philippe Coutinho to Barcelona paving the way for both Van Dijk and Alisson Becker's arrival.
But with limited scope for such outgoings, and with the need still remaining to nail down the future of Mohamed Salah, FSG would have to find the money from somewhere, and that would likely be to the detriment of the balance sheet. But with the club in need of adding younger pieces to the puzzle in order to make sure that they aren't left with a costly rebuilding job in three or four years time, it could be a rare occasion where that kind of move is sanctioned.
Not only would it break Liverpool's own record but it would mean that the Reds would have to do something that they haven't done before, but one that all of their 'big six' rivals have.
When it comes to breaking the transfer record by age for players in the Premier League, Manchester United, Tottenham Hotspur, Chelsea and Manchester City all have record buys that still exist for an age group.
Manchester United's signings of Anthony Martial, Jadon Sancho, Paul Pobga, Romelu Lukaku, Harry Maguire and Edwin van der Sar all remain the highest fees paid for players at their respective ages.
Arsenal's signings of Theo Walcott, current Liverpool man Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Sokratis Papastathopoulous see them on the list, with Spurs' additions of Tanguy Ndombele and Fernando Llorente see them on the list at 22 and 32, respectively.
Manchester City's signing of Jack Grealish saw him become the Premier League's most expensive 25-year-old, with Riyad Mahrez remaining the League's most expensive 27-year-old.
The £17m paid for Claudio Bravo during the 2016/17 season remains the highest fee paid for a 33-year-old in Premier League history.
Chelsea also feature. The Stamford Bridge club's purchase of Christian Pulisic made him the most expensive 20-year-old in Premier League history, with the signings of Lukaku at 28, Andriy Shevchenko at 29 and Olivier Giroud at 31 all making the list.
The figures, presented on social media by Omar Chaudhuri, chief intelligence officer at the Twenty First Group sporting insights firm, also include Wolves' addition of Fabio Silva in 2020 as a £35m 18-year-old. Liverpool don't feature.
Any move for Bellingham in the summer, whether before or after his 19th birthday, would move Liverpool onto the list, with the fee needed to prise the Stourbridge-born midfielder away from Signal Iduna Park likely to be almost triple what Wolves paid for Fabio Silva at 18 or what Manchester United paid to sign a 19-year-old Martial from Monaco.
Liverpool have form for breaking new ground, though, despite the perceived lack of transfer spend.
The signings of Alisson and Van Dijk were, at the time, world record signings until they were eclipsed by Chelsea's addition of Kepa Arrizabalaga for £71m and Manchester United's capture of Maguire for £80m.
Records are there to be broken, and Liverpool would have to do just that to land a talent like Bellingham.
