Liverpool look to have identified their ideal replacement for outgoing sporting director Julian Ward.
After surprising manager Jurgen Klopp with his decision to leave Anfield at the end of this season, having spent just one year in the role following Michael Edwards' departure last summer, Ward has left an important position vacant. The Reds have been searching for a successor throughout the campaign and seem to have landed on their man: Paul Mitchell.
According to Get Football News France, Liverpool chiefs have been in talks with the current Monaco transfer chief over a potential move to replace Ward. It's expected that Mitchell, who hails from Stalybridge and was previously tipped to join Manchester United, will leave the principality this year and Reds executives hope to prise him to Anfield.
The former Wigan Athletic and MK Dons player, 41, has an exceptional track record when it comes to signing top talents for the host of clubs he's worked for. Southampton, Tottenham and RB Leipzig are just some of the sides he's lent his expertise to, with Klopp's Liverpool primed to be the next.
With that in mind, here are six of his biggest transfer success stories.
Sadio Mane
Starting with our headline act, Sadio Mane was brought to Southampton in 2014 for just £10million from Red Bull Salzburg. Despite the Senegalese forward being linked with a switch to Borussia Dortmund - where Jurgen Klopp was still in charge - Paul Mitchell swooped in for the Saints and secured a cracking deal.
Within two years, Southampton would sell Mane to Liverpool and make £24m profit. Now embarking on his first campaign with Bayern Munich, it's safe to say he was well worth the fee for both clubs.
Heung-min Son
Like Mauricio Pochettino did earlier in the year of 2014, Mitchell swapped the Saints for Spurs in his next role and only furthered his growing reputation. When Heung-min Son was only known as a promising attacker in the Bundesliga with Bayer Leverkusen, the transfer guru sussed out a £22m deal and he's now a Tottenham great.
Although he appears to be past his prime at this stage, Son was once valued at more than five times his initial fee which took him from Leverkusen potential to North London stardom. A proper bargain.
However, Mitchell's decision to bring in the South Korean wasn't met with widespread acclaim at first. "I took quite a lot of criticism in my first year at Tottenham, for some of the decisions and Sonny was at the centre of that and it's a little bit of learning for me," he told Sky Sports.
"I remember there was this narrative that started to grow internally and externally as well, that he wasn't a good finisher. I remember one of the staff members saying to me, when I was watching a training session and I said 'you're wrong' because his history shows in two different clubs and Leverkusen being a big club, that he's a very astute finisher off both sides."
Dele Alli
With links to MK Dons from his playing days and post-retirement, Mitchell had been at Tottenham less than four months when Dele Alli came through the door as an exciting teenage talent. Immediately making himself a staple of Pochettino's starting XI, Alli looked set for big things.
Unfortunately, the midfield playmaker's career is only going one way, as a struggling loan spell with Besiktas this season marks his downfall from his days as one of the Premier League's hottest prospects. In Mitchell's defence, you can only lead a horse to water and he did just that.
Kieran Trippier
In that same summer of 2015 when a slew of promising arrivals were sanctioned, Spurs fans enjoyed watching a true transformation thanks to Pochettino and Mitchell's savvy recruitment. A more familiar name to Premier League fans was Burnley right-back Kieran Trippier, who despite being relegated the season prior, showed that he was more than capable of playing at the top level.
For a mere £3.5m, Trippier came to White Hart Lane and spent two years preparing to succeed Kyle Walker - who'd soon join Manchester City for £45m - as Tottenham's first-choice right-back. The England international has only improved thanks to spells with Atletico Madrid and Newcastle, having left Tottenham in 2019.
Toby Alderweireld
The final players of our Spurs quartet, Toby Alderweireld formed one of the Premier League's most imperious recent centre-back partnerships alongside compatriot Jan Vertonghen during Pochettino's heyday in charge. Manchester United's constant interest told the story of how good the Belgian defender was, but it wasn't just at Tottenham where Mitchell signed him.
During his role as Southampton's head of recruitment and just weeks after Pochettino left in 2014, Alderweireld was snapped up on loan from Atletico Madrid and duly impressed under Ronald Koeman. A year later, Pochettino and Mitchell returned to their old stomping ground to whisk him away.
Christopher Nkunku
To east Germany for our last pick and where Mitchell moved in February 2018, linking up with Ralf Rangnick in the Red Bull sporting hierarchy. Christopher Nkunku may be regarded as one of Europe's most feared forwards at present and believed to on his way to Chelsea this summer in a £61m transfer package, but back when Mitchell swooped for him he was much less sought after.
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A product of the Paris Saint-Germain academy, a club known to harvest and then waste elite-level homegrown talent, the dynamic Frenchman joined Leipzig in 2019 for around £11.4. Taking a couple of seasons to find his bearings, a magnificent 2021-22 campaign saw him bag 55 goals and assists across 52 appearances in all competitions, and before his injury this term started at a similar rate.
In short, Mitchell knows a player. "We're delighted to have Paul here," Rangnick said when welcoming him to the Red Bull project. "The results of his work at Southampton and Tottenham are very impressive."
Liverpool want that very same work.
