With the World Cup in the rear-view mirror and their mid-season training camp in Dubai concluded, attention has turned to the resumption of domestic action at Liverpool.
After becoming something of a breakout star of the Qatar competition, Enzo Fernandez has seen himself linked with a move away from Benfica with Liverpool, naturally, one of the giants named in connection with the Argentina midfielder.
Fernandez's performances alongside Lionel Messi and co in the Middle East were enough to see him win FIFA's Young Player of the Tournament award and his stock has sky-rocketed since the competition began five weeks ago and ended on Sunday with a dramatic penalty shootout triumph over France.
A story in Diario La Capital in Argentina reported last week that an agreement had been reached between Benfica and Liverpool over Fernandez to join next summer. "The English club already has an agreement in principle with the Portuguese club to incorporate the young Argentina midfielder from June 2023," read their story.
Senior sources both in Dubai and on Merseyside were quick to dismiss those reports at the time, however. The ECHO understands there is currently no agreement in place for Fernandez, but the dismissal of that particular claim does not necessarily mean there is no interest in the player.
READ MORE: Gary Neville shares Jurgen Klopp view as Liverpool target Jude Bellingham answers question on future
At the age of 21 - and at a club whose reputation for selling up-and-coming stars like Benfica is legendary - there is plenty about potential Fernandez interest from Liverpool that makes sense.
The club have utilised their Portuguese contacts in an exemplary manner in recent times, bringing in both Luis Diaz and Darwin Nunez from the Primeira Liga this calendar year alone. Sporting director Julian Ward has extensive knowledge of the game in Portugal, having previously worked both in the Seleccao national squad set-up and as a scout of the region for Manchester City.
Liverpool have a good relationship with Benfica too, not least Ward's with their president, Rui Costa, further adding another layer of intrigue for those hoping for reported admiration in the World Cup winner to manifest into something more serious in the January window.
Given the relatively small set-up compared to other clubs of comparable size in the Premier League, Liverpool scouts do not necessarily hone in their focus on one particular player.
Those tasked with talent scouting are dispatched to view fixtures and keep an eye on several performers in the same match. Fernandez, given his talent and age, will have had the rule run over him during Benfica's fixtures as a result, with a particular focus on his displays in the Champions League, where the standard is generally accepted to be greater than domestic matches where Benfica often dominate.
With Fenway Sports Group still quietly exploring their options over a potential sale of the club outright, while also scouring the globe for external investment, there is much uncertainty at the very top of the club just now. Add in the impending exit of both sporting director Julian Ward and head of research Ian Graham in the summer of 2023 and it's difficult to accurately gauge a whole lot about Liverpool's mobility in the transfer market, both in the short and long term.
What is easier to analyse, however, is what Liverpool are or aren't able to do based on their Premier League finish this term. Failure to ensure they are in next season's Champions League could have hugely significant ramifications, particularly when it comes to being able to be in the hunt for the game's leading players.
“[The top four] is always our goal at the start of the season,” CEO Billy Hogan said earlier this year. “Of course, qualifying is important because of the turnover we can make in the Champions League. But the way we run the club is to make sure we're as sustainable as possible. You can't automatically count on Champions League qualification.”
Those comments echo the ones made regularly by Klopp about how qualification for the top four is always the primary aim at the start of any campaign given both the status of the competition from a football perspective, but also the financial benefits that come from taking part in Europe's most famous tournament.
Liverpool earned more than £100million from their run to the final last season, and have already banked over £33m this time around from a successful group-stage campaign that has handed them a last-16 showdown with Real Madrid next year.
Those combined sums might, to perhaps more than a few people, appear to be able to pay the going rate for a certain Jude Bellingham, but the reality is those fees are often already accounted for before they are brought into the club.
Liverpool's success in the Champions League in the Klopp era has been a hugely profitable stream of revenue, particularly for a club whose ownership insist must be run in a self-sufficient manner.
In 2018, the bottom line of Liverpool reaching the final in Kiev was £72m. A fresh broadcasting rights agreement from UEFA, which began the season when Klopp's men won it in Madrid, then saw them bring in much closer to £100m. Runs to the knockout stages in 2020 (last-16) and 2021 (quarter-finals) would also have generated significant sums. The Champions League's importance cannot be overstated at Liverpool.
So while the speculation over the actual ownership of the club goes on, offering supporters the chance to dream up the kind of investment that means transfer fees are no longer an obstacle, the reality is top-four qualification remains integral to the long-term ability of Liverpool to attract the kind of players that they have done in recent years.
England international Bellingham remains the top target for many within the Reds fanbase. At the age of 19, he is viewed as a transformational signing in midfield and someone who can dictate matters in the engine room for well over a decade.
Landing the Borussia Dortmund midfielder would be a huge statement of intent for the rest of the Klopp era and another building block for the future alongside players like Diogo Jota, Ibrahima Konate, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Luis Diaz and Darwin Nunez - five players whose best years are still ahead of them at Anfield - but there will be competition, even if reports from Germany in recent weeks have been extremely encouraging.
The January window has been a mixed bag during Klopp's time at the club. But while stop-gap, emergency transfers like Steven Caulker, Ben Davies and Ozan Kabak didn't work out as hoped, the club have been able to bring in Virgil van Dijk and Luis Diaz over the last five years.
The manager has always professed that a winter deal should only really be executed if it is a player you have already earmarked for the summer. That stance, in a perfect world, is a sensible one and it's testament to Liverpool's planning that they have largely been able to sit back and watch the chaos unfold in most Januarys under Klopp.
However, with top-four hopes in a precarious position just now, might this winter force a change in tact from those who make the key strategic decisions at Anfield? With the Champions League and its accompanying riches evidently so vital to the project at Liverpool, could it alter the thinking of FSG next month?
It might be better to speculate now to accumulate later for the Boston-based group. Sizable investment from an external source is more realistic when there is Champions League football on the agenda next season, after all.
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