He's on par with Salah: Liverpool signed Diaz over "Europe's best player"

This week, Arne Slot tasted the first truly crushing defeat of his Liverpool tenure.

Liverpool are out of the Champions League, with Paris Saint-Germain winning on penalties to set up a quarter-final tie with Aston Villa.

However, Liverpool are also 15 points clear at the top of the Premier League, with Sunday also bringing the Carabao Cup final against Newcastle United.

While it’s almost certain that Liverpool will enjoy a trophy-winning season to celebrate Slot’s first year at the helm, change is bound to be afoot this summer, with the likes of Luis Diaz facing an uncertain long-term future on Merseyside.

Luis Diaz’s Liverpool future

Diaz is an electric-paced and slippery winger capable of causing even the sternest of opponents a spate of problems across a contest.

Only last month, pundit Danny Murphy claimed the Colombian has “gone under the radar” somewhat this season, shifting seamlessly from his preferred wide role to help Liverpool in the centre-forward spot, perhaps the priority position in the transfer market this summer, along with left-back.

The problem lies in Diaz’s lack of cutting edge. Aged 28, time is dwindling for this talented wideman to ever truly be accepted as world-class as he simply doesn’t have the potency in front of goal, certainly not in the same vein as his opposite number Mohamed Salah.

There’s nothing wrong with that, of course. Salah has scored 32 goals and added 22 assists across all competitions this season and is

But deeper analysis highlights the cracks in Diaz’s game. He might have scored an emphatic hat-trick against Bayer Leverkusen in the group stage of the Champions League, but he has blanked across all eight of his further fixtures on the continent.

So with the £55k-per-week talent about to enter the penultimate year of his deal, you have to wonder whether FSG will feel it prudent to cash in for a pretty penny while they still can, with Transfermarkt recording Diaz’s current market value at about £71m.

He’s been a fine servant for Liverpool and is all but set to lift the Premier League in May. However, FSG may feel a bit rueful when glancing back to his £49m transfer from FC Porto in January 2022, for they could have signed a superstar rivalling Salah for the Ballon d’Or instead.

Liverpool could have signed “Europe’s best player” over Diaz

Hindsight is only good in, well, hindsight, but Liverpool’s boardroom executives must be somewhat frustrated by their failure to sign one of the season’s superstars back in 2022 all the same.

One that got away

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Though Diaz has performed admirably as Sadio Mane’s heir down the left flank, he’s only scored 37 goals across 139 matches in a Liverpool shirt, equating to a rate of 0.27 per game. Mane trumps him in this regard, with his 120-goal return from 269 appearances marking a 0.45 strike average.

Diaz, to be sure, could have made more of his gifted ability, with reporter Lewis Steele even noting he had been “wasteful and frustrating” through phases of his Liverpool career. It makes the decision not to sign Raphinha in 2022 all the more bothersome.

As Liverpool tied up a deal for Diaz, the Daily Express – via Sky Sports – revealed there was genuine interest in Raphinha, then of Leeds United, but complications and financial obstacles precluded a winter deal.

With a deal for Diaz wrapped up, Liverpool did not need the Brazil international as Leeds fell from the Premier League. Arsenal and Chelsea tussled, but it was ultimately La Blaugrana who demonstrated the strongest pull, signing him for a £55m fee.

Fast forward three years (almost) and he’s being hailed as “Europe’s best player” by the likes of Sky Sports journalist Dougie Critchley. Raphinha ebbed and flowed through his opening two years in Spain but has come alive under the wing of Hansi Flick.

The data backs such claims up. As per FBref, Raphinha ranks among the top 2% of attacking midfielders and wingers across Europe’s top five leagues over the past 365 days for goals scored, the top 8% for assists and the top 9% for shot-creating actions per 90.

Though these metrics are distorted by the 28-year-old’s comparative struggles last season. Now, his 46 goal involvements in 2024/25 are bettered only by that man Salah (54), but with Barcelona still in the Champions League, Liverpool’s talisman will no doubt be concerned that he may ultimately lose out.

Along with Real Madrid’s Kylian Mbappe and Ousmane Dembele of PSG, Raphinha is arguably the biggest adversary in Salah’s way to immortalising his name on the most prestigious individual stage, especially if Barca do indeed lift the continental cup, for he has already chalked up 11 goals and five assists from his ten seasonal displays.

Though Raphinha has played the majority of his career on the right, it’s curious that he should be enjoying his most prolific term yet on Barcelona’s left. This bolsters the argument he would have been a sensational signing for the Reds, with such a potent threat easing Salah’s burden and perhaps even making the Egyptian even better.

It could have been a partnership for the ages. No disrespect to Diaz but he’s the same age as Raphinha and dwarfed in regard to clinical output.

Liverpool missed the mark with this one.

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