Jadon Sancho wants to leave Borussia Dortmund and Liverpool are the latest club to show firm interest in signing the forward.
Since England starlet Sancho moved from Manchester City in August 2017, he has lived up to his reputation as one of Europe’s most exciting young talents and become a key player for Dortmund.
Developments this season, however, have left the 19-year-old unsettled and he is weighing up his future. Transfer talk was intensified by revelations in August that Dortmund were already preparing for his exit, in a deal potentially worth over £100million, and had begun to look for a replacement.
Sancho has also found himself publicly carpeted more than once this season.
He was fined £86,000 and dropped for their league game against Borussia Monchengladbach last month after returning late from international duty with England.
He was then forced to report for extra training alone and was on the end of stinging criticism from sporting director Michael Zorc, who went public after manager Lucien Favre initially declared the matter would ‘stay internal’.
Favre also decided to admonish Sancho publicly once more on Saturday by substituting him only 36 minutes into Dortmund’s clash with big rivals Bayern Munich, which they went on to lose 4-0.
Sancho went into the game as an fitness concern having limped out of the previous match against Inter with a hamstring injury, but Favre said: ‘He was not injured, he trained yesterday. I had to go on what I was seeing and, to be honest, it was not good enough.’
Gareth Southgate revealed he had a heart-to-heart with Sancho this week after a difficult couple of months for the young star.
‘He came to me at the beginning of the week and we had 25 minutes chatting about everything,’ said Southgate. ‘Any young player is going to have ups and downs. A couple of games he’s gone into physically a little bit fatigued. His club have taken the decision to keep playing him because he is a highly important player for them. But it was a bit of a mixed bag.’
The uncertainty around Sancho has been noted across Europe. Manchester United and Paris Saint-Germain remain interested, along with Barcelona and now Liverpool. Real Madrid, who wanted Sancho when he left City, have also revived their interest and begun the groundwork for a potential deal for next summer.