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This article is part of Football FanCast’s Transfer Focus series, which provides opinion and analysis on recent transfer news…
According to The Daily Mail, Liverpool hold an interest in signing Burnley keeper Tom Heaton, along with newly-promoted Aston Villa.
What’s the word, then?
Well, the Reds are said to be interested in the England international with Simon Mignolet’s future at Anfield still far from certain.
The Belgium international made a sloppy error in the last pre-season friendly outing against Sporting Lisbon, and is reportedly keen to play football again after dropping to No.2 in the Liverpool pecking order behind last summer’s £66.8m signing Alisson Becker.
Behind the former Sunderland stopper, the Reds don’t really have a recognised senior glovesman and were forced to sign 35-year-old veteran Andy Lonergan to tackle a shortage of goalkeepers this summer – academy options Caoimhin Kelleher and Vitezslav Jaros are injured, whilst Kamil Grabara has been loaned to Huddersfield.
Liverpool could swap Mignolet for Heaton without spending a penny
It has been reported by the Liverpool Echo that Mignolet would cost any interested parties around £12m if they were serious about signing him.
Coincidentally, that same figure is what the Clarets are said to value Heaton at, which they told Villa after the Midlands side submitted a low-ball offer of £4m.
If a club does decide to come in for Liverpool’s Belgian No.2 between now and the end of the window (Benfica have recently expressed an interest), the Reds will assumingly net their asking price for the 31-year-old given how shrewd Michael Edwards tends to be – the transfer guru managed to snag Andy Robertson for just £8m and sold Dominic Solanke to Bournemouth for £19m, to give some examples.
If that £12m does land in the Reds’ bank account, then they can immediately offer that to Sean Dyche in exchange for Heaton and have themselves a perfect replacement for Mignolet, given the 33-year-old’s experience in the game and his reliability in between the sticks – his 25 clean sheets in 96 Premier League games for Burnley reinforces that fact.
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