While established world-class centre-forwards may be at a premium in the current market, Premier League champions-in-waiting Liverpool still have plenty of options available to them as the summer window looms into view.
And with Darwin Nunez seemingly destined to depart Anfield in the off-season – Fabrizio Romano claims that both Liverpool and the mercurial Uruguayan are in agreement about the need for a clean break – which lucky penalty-box poacher will have their ammunition supplied by Mo Salah next season?
If not Nunez, then maybe Liam Delap?
While Newcastle’s Alexander Isak is the dream of many Liverpool fans, Delap is a more affordable, attainable but still highly-exciting alternative. The former Manchester City starlet has scored 12 Premier League goals this term for an Ipswich side for whom a ‘Great Escape’ has felt like fantasy for months now.
On the other side of the coin, Jamie Carragher wants Hugo Ekitike at Liverpool. You can see why. An elegant, rangy yet ruthless number nine currently tied to Eintracht Frankfurt, there are shades of Isak in Ekitike.
Frankfurt reportedly want £85 million, however, which could make this a no-go.
Though, as Arne Slot used his pre-Leicester press conference to discuss strikers – more specifically the type of striker he will prioritise in the summer ahead – it’s clear that a guarantee of 20-plus goals each and every season is not the only requirement.
“You want the difficult answer of the simple answer?” Slot smiled when asked about potential centre-forward targets. “The simple answer is [that you want] goals. That’s why you play a forward. He needs to produce goals.
“But apart from that, in modern day football, a number nine needs to work hard and be part of an intense pressing team.
“If you look at the teams now playing in the semi-final of the Champions League, all eleven players work their ass off. So, that is also what I’m expecting from our number nine, that he’s part of an intense pressing team. But, in the end, it’s helpful that the number nine of Liverpool scores goals.”
Arne Slot explains Liverpool striker plan as Victor Osimhen stands out
So, in short, a reliable goalscorer who can lead the press while also remaining inside of Liverpool’s summer budget.
While Delap and Ekitike could certainly be moulded into the first line of defence under Slot, there is one ‘Goldilocks’ centre-forward who appears to fall neatly into all three of those categories.
As Romano explains, Victor Osimhen has a £60 million release clause in his Napoli contract. There is even a chance that the Serie A challengers are willing to accept a lower fee, such is their desire to cut ties with a man loaned out to Galatasaray following a dramatic breakdown in relations at the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona.
A breakdown which, it should be said, was more Napoli’s fault than that of the prolific Nigeria international.
So Osimhen, at a maximum of £60 million, should come far cheaper than Ekitike and certainly Isak. An advantage he has other Ekitike and Delap, meanwhile, is a proven track record in a multitude of different leagues.
Quite simply, wherever Osimhen goes, an avalanche of goals tend to follow in his wake.
Since the beginning of 2018/19, when he was playing for Charleroi in Belgium, Osimhen has scored 143 goals in 152 club matches. He impressed in France with Lille, ended Napoli’s three-decade wait for a Scudetto, and is currently averaging just shy of a goal-per-game in Turkey [29 in 34 Galatasaray appearances].
Osimhen is the pressing striker Arne Slot wants at Anfield
As the Football Talent Scout website explained last year, meanwhile, when it comes to pressing as well as goalscoring, Osimhen is one of the stand-out centre-forwards in world football.
“Victor Osimhen is a very athletic, fast and imposing striker,” Youssef Maaoui wrote. “[He also provides] elite pressing and defensive discipline that aids the whole team to put pressure on defenders and force them into mistakes.
“With all of this in mind, we can say that Victor is a very dangerous player to play against and a nightmare for certain defenders.
“Osimhen’s pressing is right up there with some of the very best in the world.”
Stats website Fbref, meanwhile, ranked Osimhen in the 98th percentile for strikers across Europe’s top-five leagues when it came to ‘pressures in the final third’. To put it plainly, Osimhen excels when forcing defenders into mistakes, creating opportunities he himself would often punish ruthlessly.
“While he may seem lanky and un-athletic, Osimhen is actually a really good presser,” adds Breaking The Lines. “Useful in pinning back defenders and intercepting passes in the opponent’s third.”
They use the example of a goal Osimhen scored in a 4-0 hammering of Sampdoria back in 2021. Forcing the home defence into a mix-up inside their own half, he lays the ball out wide before darting to the back post. Osimhen then bundles home from close range, his first of a brace at the Marassi.
“Ask the opposition defenders how much they suffered,” then-Nigeria boss Jose Peseiro said after Osimhen forced a similar error from the Cameroon backline to help fire Nigeria into the semi-finals of the 2023 African Cup of Nations.
“Nobody can win a match alone, everybody has to play. But he is a good example [of what a difference one player can make].”
Affordable, prolific, and an excellent leader of the press; As Arne Slot searches for a new Liverpool number nine, Victor Osimhen may be where his finger ends up pointing.