Liverpool have been urged to launch yet another transfer raid on Premier League rivals Southampton.
In the space of three-and-a-half years between the summer of 2014 and January 2018, Southampton served as an unofficial feeder club to Liverpool with no fewer than half a dozen players switching from St Mary’s to Anfield.
The Reds captured a hat-trick of ‘L’ signings in one window alone in 2014 as Adam Lallana, Dejan Lovren and boyhood Kopite Rickie Lambert set off on what became a well-trodden path.
They were then followed by Nathaniel Clyne the next summer and Sadio Mane in 2016 while after earlier abandoning their efforts to sign him and apologising amid the threat of sanctions due to an illegal approach, Virgil van Dijk finally became a Liverpool player for a then world record fee for a defender of £75million in January 2018.
Although the supply line from Hampshire to Merseyside has since dried up – with Danny Ings and Takumi Minamino (loan) but going in the opposite direction – Jurgen Klopp has been advised to go talent-spotting on the south coast again.
Gini Wijnaldum is set to quit Anfield this summer when his current contract expires and Liverpool could be looking for midfield reinforcements.
After picking Southampton captain James Ward-Prowse in his Team of the Week column for BBC Sport, alongside Reds trio Mohamed Salah, Roberto Firmino and Trent Alexander-Arnold, Garth Crooks declared: “He was instrumental in everything Southampton did last Tuesday against Crystal Palace.
“Danny Ings and Che Adams may have got the goals that night but it is Ward-Prowse who makes my team.
“The Saints demolished the Eagles and then did the same to Fulham a few days later, with Adams, Nathan Tella and Theo Walcott scoring this time, and Ward-Prowse getting an assist.
“Ward-Prowse, in my opinion, has been Southampton's player of the season. They will do well to keep him. He's a Liverpool player if ever I saw one.”
