Iraola Warns Liverpool Need Wingers Before Season Starts
Andoni Iraola admits Liverpool are heading into the new season light in wide areas – and he is not pretending otherwise.
The Liverpool head coach, preparing for his first Premier League campaign in charge, has seen a £50m offer for Brighton winger Yankuba Minteh knocked back this week, while the club have also explored a move for Paris St-Germain’s Ibrahim Mbaye. PSG’s Bradley Barcola remains the primary target as Liverpool scramble to add at least one winger before the window shuts.
Iraola’s winger warning
Asked about the state of his squad, Iraola did not dress it up.
"As a manager, this is an easy one for me. I wanted the players for the first day on 13 July - everyone here and all the positions doubled with top-level players," he said. "But you understand how the competition works, that (the) market is open and you start the competition. We have to adapt as coaches to this situation.
"I hate these two weeks or these 10 days that we have because there is a lot of uncertainty – but not in Liverpool, everywhere. But we have to adapt."
The uncertainty is clearest out wide. With Mohamed Salah gone and no specialist replacements through the door yet, Iraola was blunt about what is missing.
"You are asking me what we need - there are certain situations that for me are clear – especially now on the wing because we don't have enough players specific to play in those positions," he said.
The search has taken Liverpool across Europe. Minteh has already been the subject of a rejected £50m bid. Mbaye has been discussed. Barcola is still the name at the top of the list. Liverpool know they need quality, not just bodies.
"It's not about signing because we need a player here. No, it's about improving the squad," Iraola stressed. "And we have very good players already here, so to improve our very good players, you need like a specific level of player, yes."
Busy window, big departures
Liverpool’s rebuild under Iraola has already brought notable arrivals. Victor Munoz has come in for £34.5m, while Ronald Araujo has joined on loan from Barcelona to bolster the defence. Jeremy Jacquet’s £60m move from Rennes was agreed back in January and has now been completed, adding another powerful option at centre-half.
The churn, though, has been just as dramatic at the other end of the squad list.
Salah, Andy Robertson and Ibrahima Konate have all left Anfield this summer, stripping away experience and dressing-room weight in one sweep. Curtis Jones is in Italy, finalising a £30m move to Inter Milan.
It is a lot of change in a short space of time. Inside the club, there is an acceptance that the final days of the window will have to be frantic. Iraola has been saying as much since pre-season in the United States, when he also flagged concerns about defensive depth.
Speaking to Jamie Carragher on Sky Sports, he underlined that the work is far from done.
"We will definitely sign some players. Some deals you have to wait until the end. But the end is the important picture, the one we will have on September 1. Because it is true that we are still quite thin."
Thin, but not desperate – at least not publicly. The message is clear: Liverpool will wait for the right level of player, even if it means sweating through the final days of the window.
Jones exit ‘understood’
If the search for wingers is about filling a clear tactical gap, the situation with Jones has been more emotional.
"With Curtis, you know. I think it's still not official but there is an ongoing situation," Iraola said. "I understood with Curtis. I talked to him. I think in the first or second training session we talked.
"I value him a lot as a player. He loved this club – it was very clear since the beginning for me – but I understood that probably the outcome was going to be what it has been at the end."
"I've never hid it - for me Curtis is a very good player. A very, very good player, but I understood straight away when he talked to me about his situation. It was a situation that could happen and it looks like it is going to happen."
A manager who rates the player, a player who loves the club, a move that still goes through. Modern football in a nutshell.
So Liverpool push on, short of wingers, heavy on defensive reinforcements, and braced for a late-window scramble. The question now is not whether Iraola will get signings – he is adamant he will – but whether the club can land the kind of wide attacker who changes the feel of a season before 1 September locks this new era in place.
