Luis Suarez has hinted £40m transfer trouble is on the horizon for Liverpool

In the last 10 years, bids of around £40m have told everything about Liverpool’s position in the world game.

Flashback to the summer of 2013 and Arsenal’s infamous but short-lived pursuit of Luis Suarez provided manager Brendan Rodgers with an unwanted distraction ahead of the Reds’ international tour of Indonesia, Australia and Thailand.

Fresh from a stunning seventh-place finish in the Premier League, the Liverpool star was courted by the Gunners and later the subject of a club-record bid of £40,000,001.

Despite announcing his intention to hand in an official transfer request to agitate a move to north London, captain Steven Gerrard’s input ultimately persuaded the Uruguayan to stay at Anfield for one final season.

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But 12 months and 31 Premier League goals later, Suarez was linked with Lionel Messi and Neymar Jr at Barcelona after his stunning 2013/2014 campaign was rewarded with a move to Barcelona.

Even with Suarez’s championship, Liverpool had found themselves pipped to the Premier League title by Manchester City. But despite boasting an exciting collection of attacking talent – with e.g. Daniel Sturridge, Raheem Sterling and Philippe Coutinho – the Catalan club’s lure proved too much for Suarez to resist.

Three-and-a-half years after Suarez moved to Spain and had a Champions League and various La Liga successes to show for his efforts, the heir to his Anfield throne, Coutinho, was unwavering in his stance on joining his former team – mate at Camp Nou. In January 2018, he sealed a £142m transfer to Barcelona.

For Liverpool, led by former sporting director Michael Edwards, it was arguably the most successful piece of business in the club’s history as the eye-popping injection of cash helped fund transfer deals for Virgil van Dijk and later Alisson Becker, who later played instrumental roles in the Reds’ trophy-sweeping three-year period between 2019 and 2022.

The pair’s influence, along with manager Jurgen Klopp’s masterminding, enabled Liverpool to bounce back from a short-lived spurt in the careers of Suarez, Sterling, Coutinho and even Emre Can back to the top flight. A destination where it is actually possible to eat at the same table as Real Madrid, Man City and Barcelona if you want.

However, that status could be tested in the short term, at least with the newfound riches of the Saudi Pro League looking to ruffle the feathers of the Premier League and beyond. A £40million bid has been made by Al Ittihad for midfielder Fabinho, with the 29-year-old Brazilian subsequently left out of Liverpool’s 32-man squad for the upcoming 10-day tour of Germany.

Indeed, the offer – which would see the Reds recoup almost all of their outlay for AS Monaco five years ago – for a player whose powers deteriorated significantly during 2022/23 is understandably too enticing to turn down. But the fact he tallied the fifth-highest number of minutes across the entire competition last season underlines his recent importance and the nature of his shock departure from Anfield.

And unlike the potential departure of captain Jordan Henderson, which has seen competition for places at Anfield intensified by the arrivals of Dominik Szoboszlai and Alexis MacAllister over the summer, Liverpool are a one-man band when it comes to natural defensive midfielders in their senior ranks .

In reality, the task of replacing Fabinho will not be too dissimilar to the struggles Rodgers endured as he searched for a successor to his Uruguayan maverick. And with Chelsea edging closer to sealing a move for Brighton’s Moises Caicedo, Declan Rice has put pen to paper on a £105million move to Arsenal and Rodri is an elusive cog in Man City’s latest treble-winning side, the Premier League’s best in the class. are all out of touch this summer.

The Saudi attack in Klopp’s side doesn’t look set to stop there either, with Henderson, despite his inclusion in the Reds’ squad for their venture into the Black Forest, still the subject of a lucrative offer from Al Ettifaq. If Ettifaq manager and former Reds captain Gerrard ultimately has his way, the 33-year-old will join Roberto Firmino, Karim Benzema, N’golo Kante, Cristiano Ronaldo and Edouard Mendy as the latest superstar to move to the Middle East.

It means that with such riches on offer, as Fabinho will soon find out, Klopp has a unique challenge on his hands to maintain Liverpool’s position as the leading framework for tomorrow’s stars and not just a Saudi Arabian stepping stone. Of course, the transfer of Szoboszlai earlier this month, who was being chased by Champions League boasters Newcastle United, shows that the Anfield draw is very much alive – even without involvement in Europe’s premier competition.

But as Saudi Arabia prepare to upset the rankings of the game’s established leagues while bolstering their bid to host the 2030 World Cup with a staggering swoop for two-thirds of Liverpool’s near-quadruple-winning midfield, European clubs will now begin to peer over their shoulder in fear.