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Liverpool are one of the most feared teams in Europe and they are certainly making themselves known this summer.
The Reds are not messing about during their break ahead of the new season, with all the signs in place that they are going to go all-out to retain the Premier League.
Winning the Champions League will also be high up on their priority list, if not top, with the reinforcements they are trying to bring in making shockwaves throughout Europe.
Florian Wirtz is so nearly a Liverpool player according to all the reports, with the final details being ironed out before his record-breaking £126m transfer to the Reds.
Wirtz rejected both Manchester City and Bayern Munich before agreeing to join Liverpool, with the latter a hard decision to make for one of Germany’s own.
This has certainly caused a bit of uproar in his homeland, with the move being viewed very differently to how it is over here in England.
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Wirtz has been tearing up the Bundesliga ever since he made his debut aged just 17 and has become one of the nation’s sweethearts.
However, rejecting a move to the German champions hasn’t gone down too well, with journalist Raphael Honigstein explaining on CBS how it has hurt the reputation of the league, but will also excite many.
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“The take is that Bayern has lost out here, it’s a defeat.
Once the chase becomes so public and they fail to get their man, it feels like a let down for the club and for German football as a whole,” Honigstein explained.
READ MORE: Liverpool fans are all saying the same thing about when Florian Wirtz should be announced
“The regret of seeing him leave the Bundesliga, not seeing him on a daily basis for Leverkusen anymore is tempered by the fact that we’re gonna see him play for Liverpool and I think that is going to be a huge sense of pride and excitement in Germany, to see a German player in their prime playing for such a big club.
“Liverpool are going to be even more popular in Germany and I think people are going to tune in every single week to see how he progresses.”
Arriving with such a huge transfer fee means there is, of course, a huge amount of pressure on his shoulders, especially as he is the most expensive in Liverpool’s history.
Wirtz will desperately need to make an instant impact and show the rest of the league why Liverpool wanted him so badly, something Honigstein also explained.
“He won’t just be allowed to be good, he has to do something very special,” he said.
“€150m of talent each week or even twice a week is going to be hard for him but, at the same time, he is such a strong character and it would have been easier to say ‘I don’t need all that weight on my shoulders just yet’.
“But no, he feels he is ready now, ready for Liverpool, ready for the Premier League and ready for that pressure and I don’t think the price tag will faze him too much.”
It is certainly a gamble but everyone in Germany appears to be saying the same thing, suggesting we should trust the people that have watched him week in, week out, on this one.
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