Arne Slot EXPLAINS 'important' Stefan Bajcetic Liverpool plan after transfer CONFIRMED
By
Bruce Davis
Bruce Davis
Arne Slot has explained what Liverpool plan to do with Stefan Bajcetic in the future after he completed his move to Red Bull Salzburg.
The 19 year-old Spaniard enjoyed a meteoric rise to the first team as one of the bright spots in an underwhelming 2022/23 season for the Reds, appearing 19 times and scoring a memorable goal against Aston Villa before suffering a season-ending injury issue that ended his debut campaign and severely affected his playing time last season as well.
Read more: Record-breaking Liverpool player is now about to LEAVE on transfer deadline day
Now Bajcetic will join up with ex-Liverpool coach Pep Lijnders as well as several key backroom staff from the Jürgen Klopp era, as well as former teammate Bobby Clark who has recently joined the Austrian side on a permanent deal.
There had been some uncertainty as to whether Bajcetic should have been offered out on loan, given Liverpool’s inability to sign a defensive midfielder this season.
However, with Tyler Morton set to stay at the club this season, head coach Arne Slot clearly feels that sanctioning a loan move for Bajcetic was acceptable, especially when you consider that Lijnders and company continue to enjoy a good relationship with their old club.
This is why despite interest from Barcelona, Bajcetic was always more likely to join Salzburg on loan.
'He could become a very important player'
Slot was keen to give the move his blessing on the club's official website and outlined his future plans for Bajcetic.
“I hope it will be a big year for him because he’s a very talented player and I think he could become a very important player for us, but only if he gets playing time now," he said.
“If you are that young and you’ve been out for so long, the only thing you need is playing time. He could have playing time over here, but we’ve got six or seven very good midfielders, so his playing time here will always be more limited than we expect him to play at Salzburg.
“So for him, and us, we think it’s best for him to play at the moment, instead of maybe playing a few times and then being on the bench for a long time again. It’s very difficult to keep a player fit who’s been out for 15 months when you only play him once in a while.
“So this is for the long term. Again, this club has been smart, in my opinion, in the past for not only looking for the short term, but also the long term. It’s a smart decision, at least in our opinion, to let him go somewhere, where he will hopefully play a lot of games.
“Then for next season, we’ll have a player. If he fulfils his potential, [he] could definitely, definitely play for us in the future.”
Clearly Slot believes that in the event that Bajcetic had remained at Anfield this season, he would have been too far down the pecking order to improve as a player, and reading between the lines Bajcetic will be assured of regular football over in Salzburg.
That is something that would have been hard to come by if he’d stayed with the Reds this year, and even those who feel Liverpool are short in that holding midfield position would have to acknowledge that fact.
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