The mere present of John W Henry at Anfield on Saturday afternoon was enough to set tongues wagging and imaginations racing. So when the principal owner of Liverpool later delivered a thumbs up to a demand from one particular fan concerning the arrival of a new midfielder, it went viral.
Whether the Fenway Sports Group chief even heard the fan's transfer plea is not particularly clear but the firm acknowledgement of it has further whet the appetite of a fanbase who were already convinced that a belated search for a new player was firmly underway after Jurgen Klopp's latest update in his Friday press conference.
"We are looking for it and if it is the right player we need him and if it is not the right player we don’t need him," Klopp said. "I know we have had this discussion since it all started and I am the one who said we don’t need a midfielder and you were all right and I was wrong.
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"Now we go for a midfielder. That’s the situation. But the specific point doesn’t change - we will do something but it has to be the right one. Curtis comes back, Thiago is not too far off, Diogo is not too far off, Joel comes back and that all eases the situation slightly. It would be great if no one gets on the list on the other side with a really intense time coming up.
"We know all that. We will not change how we deal with the situation so there is nothing for me to say to you at this moment. We will see."
It's set up a potentially frantic and exciting end to the window for supporters as Klopp and the recruitment team look to alleviate the ongoing injury crisis by dipping into the market.
If Liverpool are to significantly add to their squad this week, though, it will be Mike Gordon who Klopp will be most in conversation with from FSG alongside sporting director Julian Ward, whose impressive start to life at Anfield could yet be about to become even more lauded if the Reds land a top-class central midfielder before Thursday night.
Inevitably the Reds have been linked with a host of players as a result. Even when Klopp says the club are not actively looking they are named in connection with scores of footballers at other teams, so his latest declaration was manna-from-heaven for the online gossip columns and self-styled ITK accounts on social media.
Wolves star Ruben Neves, Sander Berge at Sheffield United and even Barcelona's Frenkie de Jong have already seen their name alongside Liverpool's since Friday evening. Youri Tielemans of Leicester City and, of course, Borussia Dortmund's England international Jude Bellingham have also been linked to varying degrees.
Brighton's Moises Caicedo and Konrad Laimer of RB Leipzig are two more whose futures have been linked to Anfield. Expect the names to continue the closer we get to deadline day.
Liverpool's search remains a relatively subdued one, however, with club sources insisting that the overall quality of the squad makes it more difficult to find the "right player" that Klopp has so often spoken about in his press conference. In truth, the situation is not particularly different from the default stance of quietly looking for improvements in the knowledge that it may not necessarily be possible.
While some supporters will be asking for any sort of addition to ease the problems of an injury-hit midfield that is currently without Thiago Alcantara, Curtis Jones, Naby Keita and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Klopp's more pragmatic view is a long-term one. A five-year contract and sizable transfer fee will not be handed out to a player who will find himself at the bottom of a well-stocked pile when everyone eventually returns from their respective lay-offs.
Liverpool have rarely made significant splashes in the market late in the day under Klopp and while the 2021 moves for Ozan Kabak and Ben Davies were emergency deals that yielded little return on the pitch, a 2017 raid for Oxlade-Chamberlain from Arsenal - to the tune of £35m, no less - is more indicative of a club willing to sanction big-money deals in the final throes if the "right player" is sourced.
Conventional wisdom dictates that players of rare quality, the kind needed to thrive with the Reds, are not readily available this close to the deadline, which is slated for 11pm on Thursday evening. But the moving parts of a chaotic window could yet see something emerge, which is why Liverpool are coiled if something arises.
Players like Mesut Ozil, Ashley Cole, Hugo Lloris, Wayne Rooney and Dimitar Berbatov have all previously moved on transfer deadline day in the Premier League, while Liverpool have their own history for capturing superstars late on with the arrival of Luis Suarez in January 2011. It's not a hard-and-fast rule that the window becomes a sellers' market the closer it gets to the deadline, even if managers would always choose to complete their business as early as possible.
There is, however, a litany of players whose last-gasp switches have failed to work out and left clubs counting the cost of expensive mistakes. There's a fine balance, but those in the corridors of power at Anfield have a superb track record in recent years when it comes to incomings.
The recruitment team have made a habit of swift and decisive action when it comes to bringing players in in recent times. In late January, Luis Diaz was signed inside a week after it became clear that Tottenham had made their own advances, while Darwin Nunez's £64m capture was wrapped up with relatively minimal fuss as Manchester United sniffed around the ex-Benfica striker in June.
On the outgoing front, the futures of Sepp van den Berg and Nat Phillips remain up in the air. Bournemouth h ave a long-standing interest in the latter and the shipping of nine goals at Anfield at the weekend has surely steeled Scott Parker's resolve to sign a new dependable centre-half in the Phillips mould.
Van den Berg has a string of clubs checking on his status with Blackburn Rovers and Burnley two of the more prominent. Klopp had been keen to keep both Phillips and Van den Berg in case his defensive injury problems worsened but positive updates on Ibrahima Konate and Joel Matip this week could yet see both have their situations addressed.
With less than a week to go until the deadline finally passes it should at least set up a week of intrigue and interest. Like club owner Henry, the fans' hope is that it will be them delivering the thumbs up when September rolls into focus.
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