Andoni Iraola Wants Curtis Jones Stay: “It’s Very Important He’s Scouse”

Following the return of Michael Edwards and the arrival of his hand-picked sporting director Richard Hughes and head coach Anre Slot in 2024, Liverpool saw a massive exodus of local and club trained talent. Over the past two summers, much of the sense of a local connection to the squad has been lost.

Some, like Trent Alexander-Arnold, left because it’s what the player wanted. Others, like Jarell Quansah, Harvey Elliott, and a slew of promising youngsters were sold with Slot seeming not to rate them as Jürgen Klopp had previously—or because Hughes needed funds for the signing Alexander Isak last summer.

Now, Slot is out. Edwards is out. Hughes is expected to pop the parachute and head to Saudi Arabia at the end of the summer, winning himself a lucrative payday for his mismanagement of Liverpool. And now new head coach Andoni Iraola says he’d really like to keep the last Scouser in the team around.

“I will have the chance to speak with him today,” Iraola told the press when asked about the future of Curtis Jones, who many have expected would follow his fellow club trained players and be sold this summer. “I rate Curtis very highly. For me he is a great, great player so I hope he can continue with us.

“I hope he can continue with us, continue performing the way he has been performing. And it’s very important he’s Scouse, that he’s also from here. I also like the personality. From the outside at least, he looks like a player with good character so I hope we can keep him, and not only this year.”

Jones played 49 games and 2,850 minutes last season, numbers that highlight the fact that he was probably fourth choice for three midfield places. He might not have been a nailed on starter, but he had plenty of chances. It always rather felt, though, as if Slot and the club didn’t fully value him.

Whatever the root cause of that apparent disconnect, with just a year left on his contract there has been plenty of speculation regarding his future, and reports had the player eager to join Inter Milan. With the Serie A club not able to meet the asking price, though, the chances of a sale have faded over the past month.

There have also been signals Jones isn’t simply seeking a move for the sake of it—he might have been happy to go to Inter, but an approach by Nottingham Forest ran into resistance from Jones himself. Now, with pre-season kicking off and a new head coach, it does seem increasingly likely he might stay.

It also seems reasonable to think that Iraola, whether he works out at Liverpool or not, might well have a better understanding of the value of a local connection and homegrown talent since he hails from the Basque region and played for a club in Athletic Bilbao known for embracing their local identity.

Source: liverpooloffside.sbnation.com