Without a shadow of a doubt, Liverpool have been the best team in European football this season, as they are the current leaders of the Champions League and the Premier League with the Ballon d’Or favorite in Mohamed Salah.
Cody Gakpo and Luis Diaz have been flying high on the flank opposite of Salah, giving Liverpool the best wingers in the Premier League to offset their continued striker issues with Darwin Nunez remaining a liability in front of goal.
And in addition to those three world-class forwards, Liverpool signed Federico Chiesa from Juventus this past summer. Chiesa arrived at Anfield with low pressure and high hopes, but the Italian international continues to look like a shell of himself and probably doesn’t fit the Premier League.
A Serie A return has been rumored for months, almost since the ex-Fiorentina winger’s arrival, and Napoli are showing increasing interest in the Euro 2020 hero. Sky Sport Italia report that he is one of their top targets now that Khvicha Kvaratskhelia has voiced his discontent with a club and a desire to leave, if possible, this winter, just like fellow superstar and 2022/23 Scudetto hero Victor Osimhen will after a six-month spell in Turkey.
Sky’s counterparts in the United Kingdom, for their part, are reporting that Liverpool are, likewise, among the elite clubs interested in the Kvaratskhelia sweepsteakes.
Now, Kvara is worth close to 100 million euros, even with Napoli no longer having leverage, because he is a young, special talent on the wing and a former Serie A MVP. Everyone will want him, not just Liverpool.
So Liverpool won’t be able to trade Chiesa for Kvara straight up. However, Chiesa is a valuable player with a lot of upside, is relatively young, and has a huge reputation in Italian football.
By having a talent that Napoli want, Liverpool have a leg up over everyone else in being able to swing an affordable deal for “Kvaradona”, and if they can use Chiesa to pay less than 50 million euros for the Georgian sensation, then they may be able to pull off one of the greatest transfer swap deals we have seen in ages.
