The final whistle of a troubled campaign was still likely ringing in the ears of Jurgen Klopp when he quickly diverted the focus elsewhere. Fresh from a chaotic 4-4 draw with Southampton, the then Liverpool boss was already pointing towards what was expected to be a busy summer period of player trading in of May 2023.

As Klopp's midfield machine had started to considerably slow the ferocity of its gegenpress, and they finished outside the top four for the only time in the German's eight full seasons, the great rebuilding of the squad had long been anticipated by the end of the 22/23 campaign. So it was no surprise to hear the manager referencing as much, even if there was some surprise that the talking-up of expected transfer activity had come so soon after full time.

"I have a break - I don’t have training and those kinds of things - but a pretty busy period hopefully starts now as well in a different area of the game," Klopp said in clear reference to an upcoming summer window where a number of midfielders were set to be pursued.

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The evident struggles for an ageing and largely injury-prone group of midfielders meant that links to successors were always expected to arrive in their droves and players like Conor Gallagher, Matheus Nunes and Mason Mount were all assessed, while Manu Kone, Khephren Thuram and Gabri Veiga were of interest at various points too.

Liverpool were also rebuffed a handful of times by Southampton over a deal for Romeo Lavia and their attempts to snare Moises Caicedo from Brighton & Hoe Albion fell through in August. Evidently, the net was cast far and wide but given the turnover experienced that summer as the likes of Fabinho, Jordan Henderson, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, James Milner and Naby Keita all left, it was clear that a significant injection of quality was needed.

By late May the wheels were firmly in motion to add the first of four new players that summer and Alexis Mac Allister was through the door officially on June 8. The Argentina World Cup winner had long been on the radar of recruitment staff at the AXA Training Centre but prior to the tournament in Qatar, the then Brighton star had yet to start a game for his national side and had just eight caps in total.

As a result, there was some debate over how much he needed to grow to become an elite-level performer in the centre of the pitch, despite plenty of glowing appraisals from figures within the game. It's insisted, however, that the legwork was being put in prior to the late-November World Cup and Argentina's success, in fact, likely complicated things for Liverpool as his profile rose across world football.

A new contract with the Seagulls, signed in October of 2022, crucially contained a release clause, which allowed Liverpool to bring him in for what was a fraction of his true value. Mac Allister, alongside team-mate Caicedo, had played a starring role in helping Brighton to a top-six finish in the Premier League and while the former left later that summer for a British-record fee of £115m to Chelsea, that the Reds paid £35m for Mac Allister at the age of 24 represented shrewd business.

Once it became clear that Jude Bellingham, then of Borussia Dortmund, would take up the lion's share of the transfer budget at a time when more than just one midfield arrival was needed, Liverpool took the decision to eventually step away from the pursuit a few months prior to Mac Allister' addition and that call came with some backlash at the time, given the England international was being intensely linked with Anfield. The fact that there was never any guarantee Bellingham would choose a Liverpool team without Champions League football over Real Madrid was also a major factor.

Despite leaving around the time the transfer was completed, the groundwork on the deal had been undertaken by former sporting director Julian Ward, who guided the football operations team throughout. The negotiations with Mac Allister's agent, Juan Gemili, helped smooth the runway given a long-standing relationship that had been fostered during the Reds' January 2013 move for Philippe Coutinho from Inter.

Liverpool refused to disclose the fee for Mac Allister and there have since been suggestions that it was agreed with Brighton to keep the figure under wraps due to it being a sum that was generally seen as far below the going rate for top-flight midfielders around that time. Chelsea paid £105m for Mac Allister's Argentina midfield partner Enzo Fernandez, for example, just a few months prior. That, however, is only a working theory.

Mac Allister's versatility was seen a huge factor behind the decision to green light the pursuit and his career appearances, which stood at around the 160-mark in the summer of 2023, fell perfectly in the zone for what Liverpool prefer from their first-team additions. It was stressed how the likes of Virgil van Dijk, Mohamed Salah and Diogo Jota all arrived with roughly 175 senior games under their belt.

If Mac Allister had been identified many months before his eventual capture, it's fair to say there was a bit of a pivot when it came to the second addition of the summer in Dominik Szoboszlai. The club were made aware of a £60m release clause that existed in the contract of the Hungary captain at RB Leipzig, but by the time that information was communicated, the terms were inside their final days, with a June 30 expiration date leaving the Bundesliga side free to name their price as of July.

Liverpool had tracked Chelsea's Mount for a number of months and with the England international heading into the final 12 months of his deal at Stamford Bridge, there was a belief that a relatively opportunistic deal could be struck. The Londoners' £60m demands, however, saw the Reds baulk and turn their attention elsewhere. There was likely some surprise when Manchester United later paid the fee and Mount's season-and-a-half to date at Old Trafford has been hugely underwhelming.

Szoboszlai was viewed as a more viable option at the same price point considering his age, versatility and potential. Like Mac Allister, he was seen as a multi-functional midfielder and the existence of the release clause made it a much cleaner transfer to execute than messy negotiations with a Premier League rival, which would have been the reality had Mount been pursued further.

It's understood Klopp received a number of hugely encouraging reports from those who knew Szoboszlai better when the then manager looked to get a better insight into the sort of character who might be signing for £60m and the player himself was hugely enthusiastic about the chance of having the 2019 Champions League winner as his next manager. A private conversation was had with close friend Erling Haaland over the logistics of living in the North West also.

After Liverpool held exploratory and productive talks with Szoboszlai's agency, EM Sports and his representative, Matyas Esterhazy, it was revealed that they only had a few days left to try and trigger the terms before Leipzig would be able to up the asking price at the start of a new financial year.

And in a summer where Leizpig were already resigned to losing Christoper Nkunku to Chelsea and Josko Gvardiol to Manchester City, the Bundesliga club were within their rights not to be too accommodating over Szoboszlai, even for a club like Liverpool, with whom they still share a strong and respectful relationship that dates back the best part of a decade.

That meant that the release clause would need to be paid and with just hours left on the conditions, the Reds struck the deal and flew Szoboszlai into Merseyside to undergo a medical and in-house media duties. Szoboszlai spent the flight to Liverpool's John Lennon airport learning the lyrics to You'll Never Walk Alone before he was temporarily housed at a city-centre hotel.

Jorg Schmadtke was credited with concluding the deal but the short-term sporting director later revealed he felt the club were overpaying at £60m, even if he has since revised that viewpoint. “In Liverpool there was someone who cost €70million, Dominik Szoboszlai, who we brought from Leipzig," Schmadtke told Die Zeit. "Then I said: ‘It’s too expensive’. From today’s perspective, that was a misjudgment on my part. The boy was an important Liverpool player from day one. He performed better than I would have expected him to."

Having wrapped up deals for Mac Allister and Szoboszlai before pre-season had started, Liverpool were made to wait to bring in long-standing target Gravenberch from Bayern Munich. The Reds had been aware of the Dutchman's qualities for a number of years at Ajax but saw him move to the German giants for just £15m in the summer of 2022.

Liverpool continued to keep tabs on Gravenberch at Bayern and as he struggled to break into the team, it started to feel like a deal could be done around the turn of 2023. At the time, the potential for the Champions League bounty was unknown with the Reds locked in an uphill battle for a place in the top four and that made things tricky. As the scale of the full midfield rebuild started to dawn, it required a number of plates to be spun as Liverpool began to assess what their summer budget might look like with and ultimately without the income of European football's top competition.

It's believed an informal meeting with club officials and Gravenberch's father took place in April, some four months before a transfer was eventually rubberstamped and the hold up appeared to centre around uncertainties over whether or the not the Netherlands international could break into the first-team picture more regularly under Thomas Tuchel, who replaced Julian Nagelsmann towards the end of the 22/23 term at Bayern.

"It’s about just wanting to play, that’s the most important thing at my age," he told ESPN in June of 2023. "I hope this can happen at Bayern Munich, otherwise we’ll just have to look further. I told everyone that I don’t want another year like that." Gravenberch knew the writing was on the wall at the Allianz after a nine-minute cameo against Augsburg was his first appearance of the campaign four games in. It was his 34th and final run-out for the German giants.

The work of agent Jose Fortes Rodrigues was said to have been instrumental in concluding the deal between the clubs and the fact that neither giant were willing to cede much ground in their respectful negotiations was why the long-mooted transfer was only made official just hours before the 11pm deadline for the summer window on September 1.

For all the hailing of Rodrigues's work, however, it is Klopp who supporters have to thank most for Gravenberch. The former boss was privately insistent that a deal for the athletic midfielder was not a luxury add-on for a squad that had already added Mac Allister, Szoboszlai and then Wataru Endo to it.

It's understood a frank discussion was had behind the scenes over Gravenberch's signature and while the outlay of close to £40m was not spent on a whim, the former Reds boss used enough of his considerable sway with owners Fenway Sports Group and specifically FSG president Mike Gordon to free up the funds to reach a late agreement with Bayern Munich.

The changing face of Liverpool's midfield featured plenty of targets, took months of planning and cost around £150m. But with Mac Allister, Szoboszlai and Gravenberch all shining for a side who lead the Premier League and the Champions League in 2025, what has arguably been the most major on-field undertaking in years appears to have been called to perfection.