The Premier League is just two months old, but already the future of certain Premier League stars has been thrown into doubt ahead of the reopening of the transfer window in January.
International football interrupts the regular season this fortnight, and it’s a time that Premier League managers might use to assess their team’s start to the season and the progress their players have made since the middle of August.
Reds boss, Klopp – Photo: Paul Roberts / Offside.
Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp might be doing just that.
The Reds have made an excellent start to the season; they’ve won five of their opening seven matches and sit fourth in the division, just two points behind leaders Manchester City.
At this stage of the season, Klopp may know which players he wants to keep for the rest of the season and those he wants to sell on sooner rather than later, so here are THREE players he may look to move on in January…
Alberto Moreno
Photo: Marc Atkins / Offside.
Alberto Moreno has been at Liverpool for two years now, but he still hasn’t made a first-team spot his own.
And there’s good reason why.
The Spaniard has started just one league game this season, which was on the opening day at Arsenal where he was woefully below par throughout the 90 minutes.
Unsurprisingly, Reds boss Klopp has not called on him in the league since then, but the 24-year-old did get a start in the EFL Cup win at Derby County a few weeks ago.
However, Moreno is clearly not in Klopp’s first-team plans and, with it looking almost certain that the manager will bring in a full-back in January, Moreno’s future doesn’t look to be at Anfield.
Mamadou Sakho
Photo: Simon Stacpoole / Offside.
Mamadou Sakho clearly does not have a future at Liverpool.
The centre-half was sent home from their pre-season tour of the United States because of disciplinary issues, and was then asked by Klopp to find a new club before the transfer closed on August 31.
The latter did not happen, and now the 26-year-old Frenchman looks like he will play no first-team football until January at the earliest.
Klopp is not going to play him, so it would be best for both parties if the central defender left Anfield in January.
Simon Mignolet
Photo: Mark Leech / Offside.
Being the number two goalkeeper at a football club must be a tricky position to be in, and it’s one that Simon Mignolet has found himself in in the last few weeks.
The Belgium international started the season as number one, but the arrival of 23-year-old Loris Karius seems to have demoted Mignolet down the pecking order.
The 28-year-old has shown to be a capable goalkeeper at this level, even if he is prone to the odd mistake, and thus might feel that he could be a number one somewhere else, maybe lower down the division.
He will want to keep giving Belgium manager Roberto Martinez something to think about, as he looks to add to his 17 international caps, and moving to get first-team football in January would do exactly that.