The lazy consensus floating around the back pages is that Liverpool should gladly entertain Manchester City knocking on the door for Cody Gakpo. The narrative writes itself: Pep Guardiola loves a versatile forward, Liverpool has an abundance of attacking profiles, and everyone loves a tidy profit on a player who occasionally spends 90 minutes parked on the bench.
It is a catastrophically shortsighted reading of modern squad architecture.
If Liverpool bails out a direct title rival by handing them a player of Gakpo’s specific tactical utility, sporting director Richard Hughes needs his passport confiscated. I have spent two decades watching clubs gift-wrap functional depth to dominant dynasties out of financial panic or spreadsheet obsession, and the regret always sets in by February.
The Positionless Forward Fallacy
Modern football analysis treats players like interchangeable Lego bricks. If a forward can play left wing, central striker, and occasionally drop into an interior corridor, they get slapped with the modern badge of honor: positional flexibility.
Gakpo suffers from this label more than almost anyone in the Premier League. Pundits look at his frame, his two-footed striking ability, and his Dutch national team exploits as a central striker, and they assume he is a plug-and-play asset for any system on the planet.
That is not flexibility. That is an identity crisis manufactured by managers trying to squeeze square pegs into tactical round holes.
At PSV Eindhoven, Gakpo was an absolute tyrant cutting in from the left flank, operating with runway ahead of him to build up velocity. At Liverpool, Arne Slot and his predecessor Jurgen Klopp have frequently deployed him through the center or asked him to hold width in structured possession phases. He is decent at all of it, and elite at none when constrained by rigid positional duties.
Why Manchester City Wants Him
Pep Guardiola does not sign players to make them stars; he signs them to solve specific tactical puzzles. When City looks at Gakpo, they do not see a marquee center-forward to replace Erling Haaland. They see the ultimate tactical band-aid.
Imagine a scenario where Kevin De Bruyne needs maintenance, Jack Grealish is holding width too statically, and City needs a physical, high-pressing outlet who can break low blocks with vertical progression without demanding 38 starts a season. That is Gakpo.
Guardiola thrives on players who understand space retention and counter-pressing geometry. Gakpo was educated in the Dutch school of positional play and hardened by the heavy metal transition demands of the Premier League. He fits the City machine like a custom-milled gear. Handing that profile to the team currently setting the standard in English football is not just bad business; it is sporting malpractice.
The Replacement Myth
The primary argument from the pro-sale faction is simple: Liverpool can just take the £60 million-plus and reinvest it in a younger, more explosive profile.
This argument ignores the reality of the current transfer market. Finding a 25-year-old forward with Champions League pedigree, international experience, zero adaptation period required for the Premier League, and zero ego regarding squad rotation is nearly impossible for under £80 million in this economy.
When you sell a functional asset to a direct rival, you aren't just clearing space. You are validating their project while simultaneously weakening your own margin for error. Squads do not win titles on starting XIs alone; they win them because the substitute coming on in the 72nd minute against a low block can change the arithmetic of the match.
Gakpo is that arithmetic.
The Honest Downside
Let us be entirely transparent about the counter-argument. Gakpo has moments of maddening invisibility. There are matches where he drifts out of the contest, taking too many touches, failing to impose his physical frame on center-backs who want to bully him, and looking entirely disconnected from the tempo of the match.
He is not Mohamed Salah. He is not going to bail you out with a piece of individual brilliance when the entire collective engine stalls out.
If you want a pure, untouchable superstar, Gakpo isn't your man. But championship-winning squads are built on elite role players who accept tactical instructions without sulking. When Liverpool deals with injuries, fixture congestion, and the brutal physical toll of the European calendar, players like Gakpo are the structural tape holding the campaign together.
The Real Question
People asking whether Liverpool should sell Gakpo to City are asking the wrong question entirely. They are looking at the ledger sheet instead of the trophy cabinet.
You do not strengthen the monster chasing you just because the transfer fee looks clean on an Excel spreadsheet. If Manchester City wants Cody Gakpo, the answer from Merseyside shouldn't be a hard negotiation.
It should be a flat rejection. Stop trying to balance the books and start trying to win the league.
