Liverpool cannot afford to let their already thin squad get even thinner by selling Cody Gakpo to Tottenham Hotspur this summer, or they face a disastrous season under the new boss.

The Reds’ attacking department has been decimated over the last 12 months, with the likes of Darwin Nunez, Luis Diaz and Mohamed Salah all departing, leaving new manager Andoni Iraola seriously light on forward options heading into the new season. Victor Munoz has arrived from Osasuna to provide the Basque head coach with some additional depth, but the youngster isn’t ready to carry the burden of playing significant minutes for a team with Premier League title aspirations.

Bradley Barcola continues to be linked with a switch to Anfield, but Paris Saint-Germain’s excessive £140 million price tag is delaying negotiations on this front.

It’s entirely possible that the Merseysiders don’t recruit the volume of attackers they need, and thus, they could easily end up regretting their decision to sell Gakpo.

Cody Gakpo Sale Would be Smart Move For Liverpool in Isolation

Spurs are reportedly closing in on the signing of Gakpo, and while a fee is yet to be agreed, Liverpool are expected to cite Anthony Gordon’s £70 million move to Barcelona as a benchmark in their negotiations with the North London club, as per Ben Jacobs.

In isolation, this would be an exceptional sale for the Reds. Gakpo produced an underwhelming 2025/26 season, scoring just seven goals and providing just five assists in 36 Premier League appearances.

While the Dutchman is a valuable player who provides some useful attacking attributes, he is limited in certain respects and far from indispensable.

At 27, £70 million would be an outstanding return for Liverpool, for a player they paid £45 million for, if they can pull it off.

Selling Gakpo Would Still Be a Mistake For Liverpool

While this prospective Gakpo sale would be an astute piece of business in isolation, in the context of Liverpool’s squad, it could potentially be disastrous.

Centrally, the Reds are relying on Alexander Isak, a notoriously injury-prone player, to remain fit for almost the entire season whilst Hugo Ektike recovers from an ACL injury. Behind the Swede, Gakpo is the only senior player capable of doing a job as a striker, before Iraola is forced to turn towards a false-nine option.

Off the left — Gakpo’s primary position — there are a few more candidates to take the Netherlands international’s minutes, although they’re inexperienced at the top level. Munoz looks promising, but it’d be a huge gamble to rely on a mixture of him and 17-year-old Rio Ngumoha as the exclusive left-wing options for the entirety of next season.

While not often deployed on the right, Gakpo could’ve filled in on this side if needed. If Liverpool sanction his departure, they’d be left with the following fit senior attackers:

• Alexander Isak
• Federico Chiesa
• Victor Munoz
• Rio Ngumoha (if he registers as ‘senior’)

The likes of Florian Wirtz, Harvey Elliott and Jeremie Frimpong can be drafted in as forwards, while new signings can still be made, but time is running out for Iraola to construct an attacking unit deep enough to compete on multiple fronts. Selling Gakpo might only make things worse, even if rejecting such a significant offer from Spurs might not be popular.

All Statistics via FotMob – correct as of 15/08/2026

The ownership at Liverpool has had a big shake-up this summer, with Fenway Sports Group (FSG) announcing the sale of a minority equity stake in the Anfield club. In short, this now means that Jeff Bezos has become a co-owner of the Premier League side.

The Amazon founder is part of an investment group, 1982 Holdings, who have purchased around a 33% stake in the Merseyside outfit for around £1.35 billion. Amit Bhatia leads the consortium, with Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin also attached to the project.

Bezos is understood to be the third-richest man on the planet, with a net worth estimated at £207.505bn. This level of wealth comes with ethical questions, especially for a club like Liverpool, which has long represented itself as having a socialist ethos and working-class solidarity once championed by legendary manager Bill Shankly​​​​​​.

Zarah Sultana Questions Israeli Links to Amazon Amid Liverpool Investment

REUTERS/Andrew Couldridge

British MP Zarah Sultana, who is a member of the socialist political party Your Party, has taken to social media to slam Bezos’s investment in Liverpool. In a lengthy statement, which has gone viral on X, she wrote:

She then went on to explain how Amazon has ties to an AI service which helps aid Israel’s genocide in Palestine. Questioning how this reflects on a club which is supposed to have such strong social values, Sultana wrote:

“Amazon is a central partner in Project Nimbus, providing cloud and AI services to the Israeli state. While Israel carries out a genocide against the Palestinian people, Amazon’s technology helps underpin the infrastructure that makes it possible. And now that fortune is buying its way into Anfield.

She concluded: “Liverpool is more than a business, it’s a community. Supporters have a voice. We’ve used it before: against the Super League, against ticket price hikes and against owners who forgot what this club stands for. We MUST use it again.”

Clause Means 1982 Holdings Could Complete Full Liverpool Takeover in Near Future

For those Liverpool fans who agree with Sultana’s point of view, it will be concerning to learn about a key clause within the deal. As per The Athletic, there is a mechanism which could allow Bezos and co to complete a full takeover of the Premier League club in the next 12 months.

It’s worth noting that it is just an option, and not an obligation, and there is no guarantee that the clause will be triggered in the next year. But many will find the plausible possibility of a total takeover very worrying.

Liverpool supporters’ group Spirit of Shankly have asked for more clarity on the changes in ownership. A statement explained concerns: “As Liverpool supporters, we need zero reminder of the importance of good governance and club ownership. We trust that the current owners FSG realise this, and have carried out their own due diligence because we as supporters will most certainly do our own.

“It’s important we take time to understand fully the long-term implications this deal will have for our club’s ownership and at the same time what it doesn’t mean – wild speculation about transfers and spending helps no one. It is vital for the game in general that football clubs are run sustainably, as LFC has been, and not an arms race funded by mega-rich individuals or state-backed entities.”

The group have also reached out to the Independent Football Regulator for advice.

The scorecards for Islam Makhachev‘s UFC welterweight championship fight against challenger, Ian Machado Garry, have been revealed — and they make for interesting reading.

The 170-pounders collided atop the UFC 330 fight card, which took place on the 15th of August at the Xfinity Mobile Arena in Philadelphia. It marked Makhachev’s second fight in the division, having won the title in his first welterweight fight against Jack Della Maddalena.

And while Makhachev proved to be a dominant force at lightweight, beating the likes of Charles Oliveira, Alexander Volkanovski (twice), and Dustin Poirier, things were not so routine for him on Saturday, which the judging of the fight reflected.

Islam Makhachev vs Ian Machado Garry Scorecards

Screenshot: UFC Instagram

GIVE ME SPORT covered the fight live and saw Makhachev storm to an early lead, winning the opening two rounds on our unofficial card. Machado Garry, though, appeared to turn the tide in the third and, while he was taken down in the fourth, he did score considerably more damage on Makhachev than the champion did on him. It was Islam who returned to his stool ahead of the fifth round wearing more wounds of war, with noticeable bruising on his face.

A 38-38 reading of the fight, at this point, would have been fair. It is that possible reading which may have motivated UFC boss Dana White to rip into Machado Garry when addressing the media for the post-fight press conference. “You don’t come out, shake hands and hug before the fifth round,” White fumed. “You come out in that fifth round with the flying knee or something crazy, and you’re trying to finish the fight.”

Though neither fighter instigated a flying knee, there was one moment in the fifth that seemed to put the result to rest, with Makhachev securing a final takedown.

Sure enough, one of the three judges — Eric Colon — saw the fight the same, with Makhachev winning rounds one and two, and Garry pulling things level after the fourth. However, regardless of what Garry could have done in the fifth, Colon would have been overruled anyway by Sal D’Amato and Mike Bell. Those two judges both saw Makhachev winning three of the first four rounds — the first, second, and fourth. Everyone agreed Makhachev won the fifth.

See the scorecards right here:

The Machado Garry win was Makhachev’s 17th in succession, which broke the record for longest win streak in UFC history — one more than Anderson Silva, on 16.