Liverpool have one key advantage in Leny Yoro transfer race despite Real Madrid interest

Liverpool’s interest in Leny Yoro was understandably greeted with an air of resignation by supporters on Thursday night.

The Reds are in the market for a new centre-back and have identified the 18-year-old, who is out of contract at Lille next summer, as a ‘unique market opportunity’, given the fact that, after emerging as one of the most coveted players in Europe, he is actually available for transfer.

“We have two players who have an exit voucher, Leny (Yoro) and Jonathan (David),” Lille president Olivier Letang admitted at a press conference on Wednesday. “They will be allowed to leave.”

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But while Liverpool’s attempted move for the teenager became public just hours before the transfer window opened, the signing of Yoro will not be an easy deal to complete. After all, the Reds have been here before.

Liverpool are ready to make a bid, but there is an acceptance that Real Madrid may ultimately win the race for his signature.

Manchester United and Paris Saint-Germain are also in for the teenager, with the trio making more concrete advances than the Spanish giants for Yoro. However, he is believed to favour a move to the Bernabeu and was at their Champions League final win over Borussia Dortmund at the start of the month.

Should Real Madrid indeed sign Yoro, it will mark the third-successive summer where the Reds have missed out to the La Liga outfit in pursuit of high-profile transfer targets.

Aurelien Tchouameni spurned Liverpool’s advances in the summer of 2022 in favour of a switch to the Bernabeu, completing a move worth up to £85.3m from AS Monaco.

“The first to come forward was Liverpool. We had discussions,” Tchouameni later admitted to French news outlet Le Parisien. “Then Real arrived. And in my head everything was clear.

“It was Real and not another. It's the biggest club in the world. If you claim to accomplish great things, to mark the history of your sport, there is no better. So I didn't hesitate for a second.

“I told my agent: as long as there is interest, we do everything to go there. I was already conditioned.”

Fast forward a year and the Reds were left disappointed again in pursuit of long-standing target Jude Bellingham. While they had withdrawn from the race in April, having acknowledged a move would no longer be feasible in lieu of needing a major midfield revamp and failing to qualify for the Champions League, the England international soon made it clear that Real Madrid had been the only club for him regardless.

Meanwhile, despite repeatedly being credited with interest in Kylian Mbappe in recent years, having previously held talks with him ahead of his AS Monaco exit, Liverpool knew the Frenchman would be beyond their means long ago. While the forward has finally joined Real Madrid on a free transfer this summer, such a move has been a long time coming.

Consequently, the Reds are mindful of the fact they have been unable to match the lure of becoming a Galactico numerous times in the past. And while reports in Spain claim Real have set a fee for Yoro and won't be held to ransom by Lille's demands, there is an acceptance that history could well repeat itself.

Kopites have grown sick of the sight of Real in recent seasons, having lost out continuously to the Spanish giants both on and off the pitch. As well as an increasing resignation when going toe-to-toe with the Madristas in the transfer market, the La Liga outfit have also emerged as Liverpool’s ‘White Whale’ in the Champions League.

Getting the better of the Reds in both the 2018 and 2022 finals, they also knocked out Liverpool in the quarter-finals in 2022/23 and round-of-16 in 2020/21, and won seven of the last eight competitive meetings between the two sides.

However, perhaps all is not lost when it comes to the Reds’ hopeful pursuit of Yoro. Unlike when they missed out on Tchouameni, Bellingham, and even Mbappe, Liverpool this time do have a potentially useful transfer trick up their sleeve.

The Lille centre-back is represented by Jorge Mendes' Gestifute agency, who are known to boast good relations with Liverpool, dating back to 2018.

The Reds first struck up good terms with the Portuguese representatives when they thrashed out a deal for Fabinho away from the media's glare in the summer of 2018, just days after their first Champions League final loss to Real Madrid.

A deal was concluded swiftly, which also aided Liverpool when they were able to largely keep a lid on discussions to sign Diogo Jota from Wolves in September 2020 as the Portuguese emerged as their chief target ahead of Ismaila Sarr and Jonathan David.

Meanwhile, Darwin Nunez is another one of Gestifute’s clients, as relations once again paid off when the Reds landed the Uruguayan from Benfica in a deal worth up to a club-record fee of £85m.

Former sporting director Julian Ward played a driving role in such a move, having grown close with key operators within their organisation. And while he left the club last summer, he has recently returned to the fold as a technical director for club owners Fenway Sports Group, to bolster such relations further and help aid any transfer pursuit.

Of course, the presence of Gestifute in any deal for Yoro is not going to be a decisive be-all and end-all. They also represent former Liverpool transfer target Matheus Nunes, who joined Man City from Wolves last summer, while Real Madrid shot-stopper Andriy Lunin is also on their books.

But, such familiar contacts are still most beneficial when it comes to completing transfers, with FSG’s CEO of Football, Michael Edwards, once confirming as much to Reds legend Jamie Carragher.

“People always talk about Liverpool’s recruitment, and you think of Michael Edwards with everything that he did working with Jürgen Klopp and others at the club,” Carragher said on the Stick to Football podcast, sponsored by Sky Bet.

“I went to see Michael once because I wanted to get a bit more information from him. I was expecting big insights about how many scouts Liverpool have, how they watch them, how they see different things, but he told me the biggest thing was getting the players they wanted because of the relationships with agents – it’s all about having good relationships with the agents.”

The fact that Liverpool have not yet been discouraged from trying for Yoro is telling. They will be well-informed on the possibility of any deal, along with all the twists and turns, courtesy of their relationship with Gestifute. While the Reds might expect to miss out on the defender, for now there remains a chance.