22-year-old suggests he’s not about to join Liverpool, after claims Reds are preparing bid

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Reported Liverpool target Manu Kone appears to have denied that he’s on the verge of a move away from Borussia Monchengladbach.

Kone has been one of the players most heavily linked with joining Liverpool this summer. Reports from the start of July even suggested that the Reds were readying a move for him over the coming weeks.

However, no further news has been reported since. Now, while speaking to L’Equipe, the 22-year-old was asked for his thoughts on his transfer situation.

“In my head it’s chill, it’s easy, it’s quiet, it’s soft, it thinks of nothing, everything is fine,” he said. “The more you think about it, the more you stress. Afterwards you sleep less… I sleep well, there, dreaming of everything and nothing. It will happen what will happen. It’s not at 22 that I’m going to cry.”

Kone also appeared to lay down a few criteria for any club looking to prise him away from Gladbach.

“To seduce me, you have to tell me that I will continue to progress,” explained the France U21 star. ” I’m not a sports director! I’m not really someone who will look at the city, tell me “ah that’s good”… If I like it, that I feel that I’m going to pass a course, I go for it.

“The stories, the rest, I know it’s important but I’ll see later! At worst, I’ll come back here [Villeneuve-la-Garenneto, his hometown] to play with the veterans when I’m 45 and it will be fine.”

Kone still waiting for move

It’s currently unclear where Liverpool stand on the file of Manu Kone. There was a time when the Frenchman seemed liked one of the most likely players to join the club this summer.

However, since the arrival of Dominik Szoboszlai, plenty of links to other midfielders have cooled quite considerably. And while Kone hasn’t been ruled out in the way that Khephren Thuram has, he hasn’t been mentioned for a while either.

It also doesn’t help that the Gladbach man was seen on crutches following an injury during the recent U21 Euros. Perhaps Liverpool decided they didn’t want to bring in an injured player.

From our reading of the situation though, we think Kone may in fact be an alternative option to Romeo Lavia.

Lavia looks like being the Reds’ top midfield target for the time being. But with a price-tag of around £50m, there’s currently a bit of a stand-off with Southampton.

If Saints don’t budge on the price, Kone may be in mind as a cheaper alternative.

We’d be more than happy with that. Although he maybe doesn’t quite have the ceiling Lavia does, Kone is still a very good player with a very big future. He’s right to be relaxed.