Liverpool have a NEW centre-back and he cost just £16m

Say it quietly, but Liverpool are in a little bit of a centre-back crisis.

When Jarell Quansah was substituted off on the half-hour mark in the 1-0 loss to Tottenham in the League Cup on Wednesday night, Liverpool were left with exactly two healthy natural centre-backs in their senior side.

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Thankfully these are arguably the best defensive partnership in the world right now - Virgil van Dijk and Ibrahima Konate - but the dangers of this situation were laid bare.

And the additional aspect is that these two may be ticking timb bombs.

Van Dijk turns 34 in July and is yet to agree a new contract with the club beyond the end of this season, whilst Konate is just coming off the back of a major knee injury, his seventh injury since joining Liverpool in 2021.

Joe Gomez was an admirable replacement for Konate when he was injured but is now himself on the sidelines with a hamstring issue. Quansah was substituted at half-time on the first day of the season and has been lacklustre in his limited game time since.

Quansah turned out to just have an illness in midweek and Liverpool were forced to field Wataru Endo at centre-back - not for the first time this season.

Endo had previously played there in the League Cup quarter-final against Southampton and was deployed there again today against Accrington Stanley in the third round of the FA Cup.

And, in all three instances, the Japanese captain has been exceptional.

Is Endo the solution at centre-back

He scored a man of the match 8.0 rating on FotMob for the Southampton game, and was single-handedly scuppering any counterattacking chances that Accrington Stanley undertook today.

He achieved seven recoveries in the game, joint-highest of any outfield player, indicating his ability to position himself perfectly to win the ball back before an attacking player was able to give too much chase.

But this maybe shouldn’t actually be too surprising given Endo has played nearly 50 more games at centre-back in his career than in the defensive midfield area that Liverpool fans have become accustomed to.

He primarily operated in defence in the early stages in his career for Japanese sides Shonen Bellmare and Urawa Reds.

It was only when he moved to Europe with Belgian side Sint-Truiden, before his years at Stuttgart, that a move into midfield emerged.

As a result, it appears that Liverpool may have found an unexpected solution to the crisis in the position - and he only cost £16m back in the summer of 2023.

This obviously doesn’t mean that the club should neglect to invest in the long term future of the position. Endo himself is 31 and, with the aforementioned Van Dijk being 34, it needs to be addressed sooner rather than later.

But with the level of performance seen on multiple occasions now, head coach Arne Slot has certainly found his new backup centre-back.

The club have reportedly already had an approach for Bologna’s Sam Beukema rejected in this window and are also interested in Sevilla’s Loic Bade.

But if these - or other options - don’t emerge, fans shouldn’t panic. Wataru is at the wheel and that is a very safe pair of hands.

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