It is strange to think that any of the members of Liverpool’s current squad may have played together or even against each other at different points in their career – with Mo Salah and Alisson playing for Roma together, and Andy Roberson and Virgil van Dijk up against each other when both playing in Scotland.
However, a video on YouTube highlighted the once competition that surrounded midfield duo Thiago and Naby Keita when the pair played in the Bundesliga three years ago for Bayern Munich and RB Leipzig respectively.
The video that was posted by the Bundesliga channel back in 2017 highlighted the supposed ‘Battle of the midfield maestros’ – a comparison video between the key aspects of both Thiago and Naby Keita’s game which showed them to be very similar players indeed.
I love things such as this, it reminds you of how far we’ve come as a club when two of the supposed best box to box midfielders from the Bundesliga over the past few years want to play for Liverpool and have come here during the next steps of their careers.
Who is our best midfielder?
Gini Wijnaldum
Thiago
Fabinho
Jordan Henderson
Jurgen Klopp has done an impressive job in transforming this club into one of the top destinations in European football for some of the best players in the world – which has clearly been highlighted by the signings of Thiago and Keita.
Out of curiosity, I did a comparison between the two players for the 2017/18 season in which this video was posted at the start of and it was interesting to see their stats up against each other.
Keita finished the season with the most goals and assists compared to Thiago – the Guinean finished the campaign with 6 goals and 5 assists compared to the Spaniard 2 goals and 2 assists. Their defensive attributes were eerily similar too, with them both averaging 2.4 tackles per game, as well as 1.4 interceptions per game for Thiago and 1.3 interceptions per game for Keita.
It was at the end of this season that Keita joined the Reds for £54 million, with Thiago joining this summer for just under £20 million with the pair now turning out for the Reds together – and as they say, the rest was history…
What did you think about the video comparing Naby Keita and Thiago Liverpool fans? Let us know in the comments section down below…