Liverpool, Man Utd and Arsenal ‘already have’ five star player replacements ‘to save millions’

If you follow the transfer window, you’ll have read articles over the years suggesting that club X ‘already has a replacement’ – usually a ‘perfect’ or ‘ready-made’ one – for star player X who will ‘save them millions’.

We assume this repeated style is supposed to convince transfer gossip laymen to click on the hope that their club has signed an unknown for a low price, but as we all know, it hints at an article about a young understudy at the club who could – but probably won’t – be. The next Mohamed Salah in a classy but shameless way of putting stars’ names in the headlines in the absence of any real news about replacements.

We fully appreciate the brazen allegations, particularly when they concern some of the best players in Premier League history. There are a few on this list of current players who have had such articles using their names as leverage for clicks, as well as at least two who we’re not convinced need to be replaced, by an academy star or anyone else.

Anyway, we came up with five using a very simple method: Googling “Liverpool have a replacement for” and changing the club’s name.

There are only representatives from Liverpool, Arsenal and Manchester United because Manchester City are unwilling to replace Kevin De Bruyne or any other academy-trained player, Chelsea have no other academy-trained players to promote, Tottenham have not produced a worthy player since Harry Kane and the media are unlikely to bother with such articles about clubs outside the Big Six.

Bournemouth already having a replacement for Dominic Solanke who could save millions isn’t going to draw much traffic, although we definitely want to know who that might be. Holy shit, it works.

Jarrell Quansah for Virgil van Dijk
We may not have stooped to an article about “saving millions,” but we were impressed with Quansah as many did last season and definitely considered taking over from Van Dijk.

Jurgen Klopp called Quansah’s approach in possession “special” and said he “liked him from the moment I first saw him” when he was 16. Van Dijk himself hailed the heir to his defensive throne as “a fantastic talent” who he would strive to “help” develop.

The similarities are obvious: physical dominance, composure, excellent passing range and – perhaps most notably – an air of authority that borders on arrogance.

Liverpool Echo went one step further in an attempt to prove their similarity in an article titled: ‘Liverpool already have a ready-made replacement for Virgil van Dijk to save millions.’ No notes there lads, brilliant.

They used Macro Football player impact tool, which essentially allows them to create a similarity percentage between players, and found that the player who most closely resembled Van Dijk’s style in Europe’s top five leagues last season was Quansah. A similarity rating of 98.6%, apparently. A little less than the percentage of DNA humans share with chimpanzees (98.8%), for what it’s worth.

Waldemar Anton, who has just arrived at Borussia Dortmund from Stuttgart, Cristian Romero (Tottenham), Pau Cubarsi (Barcelona) and Beraldo (PSG) complete the rest of the top five Van Dijk imitators.

Ben Doak to Mohamed Salah
Football Fancast opted for a slightly more original, but far more fanciful, headline given the players involved: ‘Liverpool’s ‘special’ teenage replacement for Salah could explode under Slot’. And they couldn’t resist a subheading of ‘Liverpool’s Salah’s ready-made replacement’ before extolling the virtues of a player who has ‘already been given several first-team opportunities at Liverpool over the past two seasons’.

Is ten “several”? It should be. He has played 37 Premier League minutes and 307 senior minutes in total, in which he failed to register a goal or an assist.

It was Klopp who said Doak was “special,” praising his “straightforward bravery,” which sounds like it might be included in the entry for the most improved trophy for a 10-year-old at the local sports club.

And even the super-positive Liverpool legend would have a hard time convincing even the most short-sighted of fans that Doak can be anything close to a like-for-like replacement for a guy who has 211 goals and 89 assists in 349 games. Someone with that potential would have been in the team more often than not last season, even at 18.

Ethan Nwaneri to Emile Smith Rowe
A particularly odd decision by several news outlets to jump on the bandwagon of replacing Emile Smith Rowe. There have been many very similar articles with prototypical headlines, but GIVESPORT went so far as to use pre-season footage in which Nwaneri mostly threw five-yard passes to illustrate their brilliant idea of ​​SAVE ARSENAL MILLIONS.

The whole reason Smith Rowe is heading to Fulham it’s because he’s not getting enough playing time. Nwaneri – who became the youngest player in the Premier League when he made his debut almost two years ago – I would probably prefer not to be your replacement, thank you very much.

READ MORE: Nwaneri is an obvious talent for Arsenal, but 15 is too young for professional football

Amad Diallo to Jadon Sancho
Amad impressed in the penultimate game of last season, scoring and providing assists at home to Newcastle, and Andy Cole and Wayne Rooney were among the former Manchester United players after the game who suggested Amad “is the man to replace Jadon Sancho”.

It gave the media outlets the space to write “already got it” articles using his quotes as if this was some kind of academy success story rather than a case of United perhaps finally making use of a player they bought for £19m three and a half years ago, at a time when they would much rather have done a deal for the man he is now being tipped to replace.

Looks Either way, Sancho will stay.

READ MORE: Manchester United start reading from the same page, but need more than just words

Myles Lewis-Kelly for Oleksandr Zinchenko
We know what you’re thinking: Arsenal need ‘a perfect replacement for Zinchenko’ having just signed Riccardo Califiori amid Jurrien Timber’s return to form? Hey, we don’t make the perfect substitution rules to make millions at the club and who are we to question the guys at Sports Bible.

The Evening Standard takes a similar view, or at least it did in January, hailing Lewis-Skelly as the “next Oleksandr Zinchenko”, possibly amid choruses of “FFS, not another”.