‘An absolute mess’ – Jamie Carragher tears into Liverpool’s ’embarrassing’ transfer situation amid Moises Caicedo and Romeo Lavia setbacks

Jamie Carragher has passionately hit out at Liverpool’s transfer strategy, calling it ‘an absolute mess’.

The Reds have endured a frustrating transfer window despite bringing in Dominik Szoboszlai and Alexis Mac Allister from RB Leipzig and Brighton respectively.

It’s been a hugely frustrating transfer window for Liverpool so farGetty

Liverpool lost out on Moises Caicedo, who opted to join Chelsea insteadGetty

Both players were signed as a result of triggering buyout clauses in their deals, however, Jurgen Klopp’s side have struggled to get any further deals completed.

Liverpool were heavily interested signing Moises Caicedo from Brighton and even had a £111million offer accepted by the Seagulls, but they were unable to get the deal over the line with the 21-year-old choosing to join Chelsea instead.

They also initially refused to pay £50million to sign Romeo Lavia from Southampton, however Liverpool later changed their stance with a £60million offer – only for Chelsea to hijack the deal with the 19-year-old now set to follow in Caicedo’s footsteps and go to Stamford Bridge.

With Liverpool in need of a deep-lying midfielder, the Reds are in a desperate situation in the transfer market and according to former star Carragher, their current predicament is ‘a joke’.

Speaking to Sky Sports, Carragher said: “It leaves Liverpool in a pretty difficult place.

“They need to sign someone in midfield and people know that they’re desperate. They put a bid in for Lavia today for £60million when they refused to pay £50million just four or five days ago.

“It’s been an absolute mess – it’s a joke.

“The biggest problem is that Liverpool have known they need midfield reinforcements since August last year, so 12 months ago.

Lavia also looks set to join Chelsea in a further blow for LiverpoolGetty

Carragher described Liverpool’s transfer efforts as ‘a joke’Getty

“People think I defend FSG, I have no relationship with them at all. But this is not on the owners, this is on the structure of the football club when you go back two years when Liverpool were the model for every team in Europe, not just the Premier League, to follow.

“When Liverpool were winning the league and getting to Champions League finals, what are Liverpool doing? They’re not spending as much money as other teams, but they were producing these players.

“Yes they’ve got a great manager but they had a guy called Michael Edwards at the top of the club as a director of football and a transfer committee – or whatever you want to call them – beneath him and it worked.

“He left and his no.2 took over and was in the job for six months and then he moved on – you’ve got to ask why these people are moving on from the football club.

“I don’t know why, I don’t know what’s going on behind the scenes but a guy [Jorg Schmadtke] has come in from Germany who has a relationship with Jurgen Klopp but he’s only there for the summer and then he moves on and Liverpool get another director of football. So in the space of 18 months, Liverpool have had four directors of football.

“They haven’t got deals done. That is your job in that role to get deals over the line – the two players that Liverpool bought had buyout clauses so there’s no negotiating and no big deal to go about, you just meet the buyout clause.

“Liverpool have not got deals over the line and it’s been embarrassing that you start with Lavia and won’t pay a certain amount, you then go for Caicedo and you get something agreed – that’s why I won’t be critical of the owners because they were willing to pay £110million and break the transfer record – but to go with him when he’s been talking to Chelsea for three month, but then they go back to Lavia – it’s an absolute mess.”