A Liverpool hero who left Anfield just two years ago was made available on a free transfer.
Divock Origi, who was once praised as a “world-class” talent by Brendan Rodgers, now faces an uncertain future after AC Milan made it known that he is a free agent. Under Rodgers’ leadership, Liverpool signed the Belgian forward in 2014, however he was later loaned back to Lille for a further year. Later on, he would come back to Liverpool and play a crucial part, not to mention his iconic goal against Tottenham in the 2019 Champions League final.
Even with these heroics, he was never able to stay consistent at Anfield under Jurgen Klopp’s leadership, which forced him to move to San Siro following more loan periods at Lille and Wolfsburg. Milan is willing to sever relations without paying a price following a period of poor performance that resulted in a temporary move to Nottingham Forest.
MLS and the Saudi Pro League are generating interest from across the pond.
Rodgers may not be interested in replicating his former glory with Origi now that he is at Celtic Park. However, Origi’s promise, which so attracted the Irishman years ago when he was a young 19-year-old plucked from Ligue 1, continues to be a crucial aspect of his early career story.
When it came time to replace Luis Suarez, Rodgers showed a great deal of faith in Origi, telling the Daily Mail, “Very few players can step in for Suarez. “It was challenging for us, especially considering the other players’ summertime availability. I realise it’s bad now, but we took Divock Origi, a player we think will be of the highest calibre, and we’ll have him in the summer.
He’s a great player now. He has it all—the pace, the profile, and so forth—and he is now capable of playing for Liverpool.
“Divock has a lot of skill. One of the conditions of our signing him was that he had to remain in Lille. As a young player, he had made it onto the Belgian team, demonstrated his abilities, and we were able to identify him.
When we saw him at Melwood, the scouting staff there gave a fantastic presentation that included him at the age of fifteen, and we demonstrated to him how we wanted him to advance in his game. He has a lot of talent. Because of the talent present, he hasn’t been able to showcase it as often as he would like, but he did showcase it last week against Newcastle and over the weekend. He is a wonderful man, and his father was also quite successful in the game.”