Garth Crooks has identified one Liverpool player as a potential ‘captain of the future’, and the man in question isn’t a member of Jurgen Klopp’s current leadership group at Anfield.
The pundit selected four Reds players in his latest Premier League team of the week for BBC Sport, with Ibrahima Konate picked as one of the defenders.
In assessing the Frenchman’s performance against Bournemouth, the 65-year-old wrote: “Konate is looking more accomplished the more I see him.
“He was immense against Arsenal in the FA Cup earlier this month without [Virgil] Van Dijk by his side, and even better against Bournemouth. He is starting to look every inch a Liverpool captain of the future.”
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After Jordan Henderson and James Milner left Liverpool last summer, Klopp formed a new five-player leadership group comprising Van Dijk (captain), Trent Alexander-Arnold (vice-captain), Mo Salah, Andy Robertson and Alisson Becker (liverpoolfc.com).
That’s a lengthy queue for Konate to try and usurp if he’s to become the next permanent Reds skipper, a role which is likely to go to his teammate in the number 66 shirt. At 25 and with Mersey blood pumping through his veins, Trent seems poised to take over the armband from the Dutchman eventually.
However, that isn’t to say that the French centre-back won’t be added to the leadership group further down the line, especially once a current member leaves. Indeed, it was only in recent days that the 24-year-old spoke of his desire to assume more ‘responsibility’ within the team.
He’s proving with his recent performances that his words are more than just rhetoric, having subdued the in-form Dominic Solanke on Sunday by winning 12 duels (eight in the air) and making nine clearances, as per Sofascore.
Konate is now approaching the prime years of his footballing career, and a continuation of the high standards he’s set recently could well see him be regarded by Klopp as a genuine leader within the team, even if that doesn’t come with the full-time captaincy.
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Garth Crooks is a buffoon. He regularly talks out of his backside. For example, his reading of Liverpool’s last game against Bournemouth was that Liverpool dominated from start to finish. Anyone who saw the game knows that it was anything but. In fact it was 0-0 at half time and Bournemouth were as likely to score up until the first goal as Liverpool. Heavknows how he’s been able to steal a living from the BBC for such a long time.
He’s like the sad old bloke you see in the pub, chuntering on about all sorts of nonsense, only with less to back it up.