Having seen failures in attempt to sign Bundesliga centre-halves Neven Subotic and Joel Matip, Liverpool have shifted their attention towards QPR defender Steven Caulker in an effort to solve their defensive injury crisis.
The Reds have made an emergency loan bid to sign the former Cardiff player, per Chris Bascombe of The Telegraph.
Caulker, 24, is currently on a season-long loan at Southampton from QPR, but he has struggled for regular games in Ronald Koeman’s side.
Klopp was keen to add an experienced defender to the side after the series of injuries to his centre-backs in the past few weeks. He was keen to sign his former player Neven Subotic, but Borussia Dortmund have refused to do any business this month.
Matip could sign a pre-contract agreement now as he is available on a Bosman in the summer, but securing a deal for him has tuned problematic as well.
As a result, Liverpool have looked to the loan market to find a short-term solution. Klopp was initially reluctant to do any business in January, but the situation has changed due to the injury crisis.
Caulker is currently on loan at Southampton, but it can be cancelled if Liverpool manage to agree a deal to bring him to Anfield on a short term basis.
Liverpool lost all their four established defenders for the Friday’s FA Cup tie against Exeter City – Martin Skrtel, Mamadou Sakho, Dejan Lovren, and Kolo Toure. Both Sakho and Toure, however, are likely to feature in Wednesday’s crunch Premier League tie, when Arsenal travel to Merseyside.
Moving to other news, Liverpool are interested in signing Serbian teenager Andrija Zivkovic, who is also attracting interests from Premier League giants Manchester City.
The 19-year-old plays for Partizan Belgrade (5m euro price quoted by L’Equipe, via 101 Great Goals) where he is the captain of the side. He is the youngster player ever to make a senior appearance for the Serbian national team, and now has been linked with a move to a big European club.
His contract expires at the end of the season, and could move elsewhere at a cut-price deal.
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