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When Arne Slot spoke in his pre-match press conference ahead of Liverpool’s trip to Elland Road to face Leeds United, it was pretty sobering for the head coach to suggest that the focus is on securing a place in next year’s Champions League proper, and not battling to defend their hard-won Premier League title.

Slot’s right, of course, with Liverpool so far removed from last year’s indomitable success that talk of mounting a challenge against high-flying Arsenal would be scoffed at by even the most ardent supporters.

Among Liverpool’s biggest problems this season has been a struggle in the build-up, especially on the right side. Trent Alexander-Arnold’s absence is keenly felt, and sporting director Richard Hughes is looking to replace the former vice-captain’s creativity.

Liverpool looking to replace Alexander-Arnold

Liverpool have technically replaced Alexander-Arnold already, signing Jeremie Frimpong for £29.5m this summer. However, neither Frimpong or Conor Bradley boast the same playmaking ability as the 27-year-old, who plies his craft for Real Madrid after leaving Anfield at the end of his contract in June.

The £116m signing of Florian Wirtz was meant to help the passing of the creative torch, but Wirtz’s struggles have been well-documented this season, and, as analyst Raj Chohan puts it, “the build-up combination is horrible” on Liverpool’s right-hand side this season.

Those around him know Wirtz has world-class potential in the Premier League and could become a superstar playmaker, a poster boy. However, he doesn’t really operate down the right lane, and this is where Slot and Hughes need to fix Liverpool’s progressive passing.

Perhaps that’s why FSG are showing an interest in signing Bayern Munich winger Michael Olise, having shortlisted the France international this week, according to German outlet BILD.

Olise, 23, has only gone from strength to strength since swapping Crystal Palace for the Allianz Arena in 2024, and if Liverpool want to secure his signature, ostensibly as Mohamed Salah’s long-term replacement, they will need to pay over £100m.

BILD believe that Liverpool have placed Olise back onto their shortlist despite Bayern’s not-for-sale stance.

What Olise would bring to Liverpool

Alexander-Arnold’s influence at Liverpool cannot be understated. Quite simply, he is a one-of-a-kind type of player, and his departure to Santiago Bernabeu was always going to be more than just a blow to the Anfield side’s pride.

1

Trent Alexander-Arnold

64

2

Andy Robertson

60

3

Leighton Baines

53

4

Graeme Le Saux

44

5

Kieran Trippier

38

Olise might not be a right-back, but he would prove the perfect Salah replacement at right wing in that he would not try to mimic the Egyptian’s clinical output, and instead bring his own flavour to Merseyside.

At Bayern, the former Palace star has posted 29 goals and 34 assists across 76 matches. He is regarded as “one of the best players in the world” by teammate Serge Gnabry.

Physical and athletic, Olise is also near matchless when it comes to creating for his peers, setting up passing patterns and adding pressure in the final third with unplayable passing.

As per FBref, he ranks among the top 1% of attacking midfielders and wingers across Europe’s top five leagues over the past year for assists and shot-creating actions, the top 4% for progressive passes, the top 12% for progressive carries and the top 5% for successful take-ons per 90.

That is not to say he’s a one-trick pony, with fearsome ball-striking qualities that the Premier League’s many defenders and goalkeepers know only too well.

He has proven himself to be a superstar in the English game, and since levelling up in Germany, Olise has fostered the playmaking brilliance that would see him reinvent Slot’s right flank and rekindle the presence of Trent at Anfield.

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1 ByAngus Sinclair 6 days ago

The allrounder will go under the knife in a bid for a long-term solution to his back problems

Alex Malcolm13-Oct-2024Australia allrounder Cameron Green will undergo lower spine surgery and looks set to miss at least six months of cricket after being diagnosed with his fifth stress fracture in his lower back.After lengthy consultations with Cricket Australia medical staff over the past two weeks following the initial injury in the UK on September 24, Green is set to follow the same path that Jason Behrendorff, James Pattinson, Ben Dwarshuis and New Zealand quicks Shane Bond and Matt Henry have taken by having screws and a titanium cable fused into his lower back to stabilise the stress fracture and prevent future occurrences. Green has spoken to WA and club team-mate Behrendorff about his experience.Related

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The recovery ranges depending on the player but it is usually a minimum of nine months, although CA believes it will only take six months. That rules him out of the entire summer of cricket, which includes the five Tests against India, the tour of Sri Lanka and the Champions Trophy. The IPL, the World Test Championship final in June, if Australia make it, and the three-Test tour of the Caribbean in June and July of next year are possible given CA’s timeframe, especially as a batter only but bowling is a different story.Scans had shown the fracture in the UK but further assessments were required back in Australia as it is understood to be a different fracture to his previous stress injuries. Green has previously had four stress fractures in his lower back, which were recurring through his junior days all the way up to 2019, a year prior to his Test debut.CA’s medical staff are understood to be flummoxed by how this fracture has occurred after successfully managing Green through the past four years of international cricket, although he has always been vulnerable to another fracture given his history. CA released a statement outlining the reasoning for the surgery.”Cam has a unique defect in an adjacent area to the fracture that is believed to be contributing to the injury,” the statement said. “After thorough consultation it was determined Cameron would benefit from the surgery to stabilise the defect and reduce the risk of future recurrence.”He had a routine scan in August, something he does regularly, that showed up clear. That paved the way for him to bowl in the UK. He sent down 21.2 overs in the UK across five T20Is and two ODIs. The most he bowled in a match was the six overs at Chester-le-Street where he did deliver a barrage of short balls as Australia chased wickets, before pulling up sore.There are conflicting views within Australian cricket over his loads in the UK considering how carefully Mitchell Marsh was managed by comparison with the India Test series in mind. Marsh only bowled four overs for the whole tour, and they came in the game after Green flew home.But it is understood there were no indicators that Green was vulnerable in the lead-in and his bowling loads this year have been far lower than in 2021, 2022 and 2023. He bowled more than 230 overs in matches in 2021 and 2022, and 190 overs in 2023. But he had only bowled 124.3 overs to-date in 2024, albeit there were four Test matches to come for him. He was coming off a rare 10-week break from playing prior to the UK tour.The particular surgery Green will have has been very successful for many players including Behrendorff, who underwent the procedure in 2019. CA team physio Nick Jones oversaw Behrendorff’s recovery in 2019-20 when he was with WA having done extensive research on the surgery and the recovery process.ESPNcricinfo understands that the specific type of surgery has been performed on 26 patients over the course of nearly two decades by New Zealand-based surgeons Grahame Inglis and Rowan Schouten with 24 of them successfully returning to full fitness. New Zealand quick Kyle Jamieson is one of the unsuccessful ones so far but his specific case is understood to be very unusual and over the weekend Gary Stead said Jamieson was on track for a comeback during the Super Smash which starts in late December.Dwarshuis had the surgery in 2019 and was back bowling in grade cricket just seven months later and played domestic cricket within 10 months. He has played first-class cricket in the years since but has only appeared in nine red-ball matches.Behrendorff had surgery in October 2019 and did not play until December 2020. He has not returned to play first-class cricket but has had no real problems with his back since then.Pattinson took 12 months to return to first-class cricket and it was another 22 months before he played Test cricket, although he had been out of the Australian set-up for 18 months prior to the surgery due to his injury issues. He retired from professional cricket at just 32 as his body wilted.Henry had the surgery in 2012 when he was just 20 years old. His recent success against Australia in Test cricket earlier this year as a 32-year-old is an indicator of the long-term success that can be had.