🚨 EOTK Insider with Neil Jones: Could Liverpool move for Florian Wirtz? Joel Matip contract future, the January transfer priority and much more!

Join Neil Jones for his weekly column with EOTK Insider, exploring all the latest and greatest transfer and news stories around Liverpool Football Club

[From left to right: Florian Wirtz, Jorg Schmadtke and Joel Matip]

Hello and welcome to my column with Empire of the Kop! You can read about all the latest updates around Liverpool Football Club and its forays into the transfer market right here, every week, with EOTK Insider. Thanks for giving this a read and let us know your thoughts in the comments!

Today’s top stories:

• Would Liverpool move for Florian Wirtz?

• Are links to Leny Yoro & Alex Baena worth keeping an eye on?

• And further updates on Joel Matip, Conor Bradley, Harvey Elliott and more!

Crystal Palace Review

It again comes down to whether your glass is half-full or half-empty when you consider Liverpool’s win over Crystal Palace. Are you saying Liverpool haven’t hit their levels yet and they will, or are you saying Liverpool’s luck is going to run out at some point and they won’t be able to keep getting back into games when they don’t play well? They’ve had a lot of those this season - it is a strange one! I speak to a lot of people who are having the same difficulties I’m having in gauging this side’s true level, but results don’t lie do they? Liverpool have only lost twice in all competitions since April; they’ve got the best goal difference in the league, the joint-best defence in the league and the second-best attack in the league. Don’t forget they’ve also already been to some of the biggest teams in the league away from home having played Newcastle, Chelsea, Tottenham and Manchester City.

There’s a lot of potential for Liverpool to get better. I don’t think ‘frustrating’ would be the word I’d use to describe those 70 or so minutes at Selhurst Park - I’d go with ‘dreadful’. They were so lethargic, they didn’t create anything nor look like a team with a plan of how they were going to win it. They just seemed to be waiting for something to happen and, obviously, the red card gives them a helping hand there because they’re then able to really pen Palace in. The contrast between the last 15 minutes to what went on before was stark and Liverpool in the end got the job done.

Harvey Elliott celebrates Liverpool’s winning goal vs Crystal Palace - (Photo by Justin Setterfield/Getty Images)

💭 Should Harvey Elliott now start in Liverpool’s midfield against Manchester United? Have your say below!

Harvey Elliott has had a great season so far. First goal of the season but it’s by no means his first contribution to the season. You think of the equaliser against Luton, which he sets up and you think of performances against Newcastle away, Wolves away and Chelsea away where he makes a difference. His form for England U21s is also noteworthy, as he’s been one of their better players. He’s definitely enjoying a good period in his development and is very much part of the first-team furniture. Elliott might be 20 but he’s already closing in on 100 games for Liverpool and he’s established himself as a senior player. It’s difficult because it feels as if he’s almost the 12th man in that you look at him and say ‘well who do you have as the third midfielder?’ You fall into a choice between Curtis Jones and Ryan Gravenberch and then you’ve also got Wataru Endo and Alexis Mac Allister to throw into that mix. You’d argue, form-wise, that Elliott has been as good as any of them! Maybe Dominik Szoboszlai is the only one who’s stayed ahead of them in terms of his general performance levels. In terms of anything else, I think Elliott has been as good as anyone this season.