Why Liverpool’s January transfer window makes no sense

When very clever people do things that make no sense to you, logic suggests there are three possible explanations:

a.) They’re so much smarter than you (and everyone else) that you simply can’t grasp their brilliance, because they’re playing 4D chess and you’re playing checkers

b.) They’re not actually that smart
c.) There’s behind-the-scenes stuff that we don’t know about

I look at Liverpool‘s movements — or lack thereof — in this January transfer window, which closed Monday, and wonder which of the above applies here. I hope it’s option c.) and all will be revealed at some point, because b.) would mean Michael Edwards’s genius has been vastly overrated, including by me, and a.) would mean I’m a fool — it’s possible, sure, but not fun to contemplate.

However, there was one indisputable fact going into the January window: Liverpool needed to add one or more defenders. If you want to dispute this, I’ll take the next few paragraphs to try and convince you. If I fail, feel free to stop reading and go back to scrolling TikTok.

– January transfer winners and losers: Man City on top
– Desperation rankings: Which Premier League teams made panic moves?
– Men’s transfer grades: Every major January move, rated

We know Liverpool believed they needed another defender — ideally a center back — because they tried to sign Marc Guéhi from Crystal Palace on Deadline Day for around £35 million ($47m) and the deal collapsed, apparently while Guehi was undergoing an MRI. That was in August.

Less than a month later, Giovanni Leoni, the young central defender they’d signed from Parma earlier in the window, suffered a cruciate injury that would keep him out for the rest of the season. Now they were down TWO defenders.

Then, on Jan. 8, 2026, another defender, Conor Bradley, saw his season ended prematurely following another knee injury. Now they were down THREE defenders.

It’s not just that. Of the defenders they do have, one is 34 years old (Virgil van Dijk), another two are free agents in June (Andy Robertson, Ibrahima Konaté) and another two are de facto wingbacks (Milos Kerkez and Jeremie Frimpong, who is currently out too, with his third hamstring injury of the season). Then there’s Joe Gomez, who had three separate injury layoffs this season missing a total of nearly two months for an array of issues: Achilles, hamstring and hip.

To be fair, they do list two other defenders on their website. One is Rhys Williams, who was on loan at Morecambe in the fourth tier last season, and hasn’t actually played first team football for Liverpool in four-and-a-half years. The other is Calvin Ramsay, once a very highly rated right back who has suffered a string of horrendous injuries and, at 22, has made a total of five league starts in the last three-and-a-half years, all of them while on loan.

You don’t need to be two or three deep at every position the way Arsenal are. But conventional wisdom says you need some sort of insurance policy in case your starters get injured, or their performance declines due to wear and tear. Liverpool have played 80 Champions League and Premier League games in the past 18 months. Van Dijk has started 78 of them and never been substituted. He turns 35 in July. Are these risks worth taking?

All this makes Liverpool’s inaction baffling. Yes, they signed one of the more promising young central defenders around — 20-year-old Jérémy Jacquet, from Rennes — but he’s not coming on board next season. What about this season?

– Scouting report: What Jacquet will bring to Liverpool this summer

There’s a school of thought that says that having spent a fortune last summer, money was tight in January, and in any case, the owners, Fenway Sports Group, run a tight ship. Maybe. But if your paper-thin corps of defenders ends up costing you a spot in next season’s Champions League, that’s likely €80m+ in potential revenue going up in smoke. (As of today, Liverpool are sixth and would miss out, by the way.) And if it means you get knocked out of this year’s Champions League in the Round of 16 rather than, say, the quarterfinals, that’s another €30m — poof! — gone. (Add them up and you could get yourself two Jacquets.)

Plus, you don’t need to necessarily find the next Jamie Carragher in January, which is both difficult and expensive. You just need a live body who can eat up minutes and can do the job to a minimum standard on the pitch.

Last time Liverpool had a defensive crisis, in 2020-21, they pulled someone named Nat Phillips out of thin air and he became a regular for half the season. They finished third in the league, and he started both Champions League quarterfinals against Real Madrid. Are we really to believe they couldn’t find somebody, even on loan? Did they even consider that? Either a promising younger player to give him a shop window and exposure to a club like Liverpool, or a veteran whose wages you might want to get off your books? Look at the financial state of clubs around Europe (and in the Premier League). There’s really nobody out there?

The weird part of all this is that they had time. October, November, December — that’s three months to make a plan and bring someone in when the window opened. Liverpool won just one of six league game in all of January. Might one fresh body have moved the needle?

Liverpool’s January inaction (Jacquet aside) was the result of one of two things. Either they tried — and failed — to bring somebody in to add depth and act as an insurance policy, which means the issue was execution. Or they simple concluded that their defensive options were strong enough — to be fair, they have the second best xG conceded numbers in the Premier League, after Arsenal — and durable enough that they didn’t need an insurance place, in which case it was by design.

If it’s the latter, it’s hugely counterintuitive and defies any sort of conventional wisdom. But hey: trust the process, right?