Liverpool didn’t renew the contracts of several players over the summer, and one of those decisions in particular may well be leaving Anfield chiefs feeling that they made the right call.
Among those who exited as free agents at the end of last season was Naby Keita, who spent five years at the club after joining from RB Leipzig.
The 28-year-old is now back in Germany with Werder Bremen, but his fortunes haven’t exactly been supercharged by the change of scenery.
As per SportBILD [via Sport Witness], the Guinea midfielder is already ‘becoming a problem’ for Die Werderaner due to his injury-prone nature, with growing frustration among the hierarchy at the Weserstadion.
Having only just returned from an abductor tear, Keita is now sidelined again with a thigh muscle problem which’ll rule him out for a few weeks.
We’re sorry to see that the 28-year-old, who showed flashes of his talents at Liverpool but had an appalling injury record, is continuing to be blighted by fitness problems after leaving Anfield.
Even though Werder picked him up on a free transfer, he’s their highest earner on just over £41k per week (Capology) but has played a mere 80 minutes since the start of the season for Ole Werner’s side (Transfermarkt).
Keita had his moments on Merseyside, netting in the Club World Cup en route to triumph in the tournament and famously scoring inside 15 seconds against Huddersfield, while he was once labelled ‘world-class’ by none other than Virgil van Dijk (liverpoolfc.com).
However, having cost us £52.75m upon joining in 2018 (Sky Sports), for him to incur no fewer than 21 separate injury absences (Transfermarkt) and not start more than 16 games in any of his five Premier League seasons (WhoScored) shows that he didn’t prove to be value for money.
It was obviously hugely frustrating for him but it was for Liverpool fans, too, and with Werder now realising how we felt for large periods of the Guinean’s time at Anfield, the Reds’ hierarchy must be very glad they didn’t extend his contract beyond the summer.