England international set to leave Liverpool in surprise move | OneFootball

An England youth international is set to leave Liverpool in what is a surprise move.

There's a lot of change happening at the club right now. Liverpool are in the process of building for the future.

Richard Hughes is trying to build a mega-team. The goal is to assemble a squad capable of competing for the highest honours for many years to come.

Naturally, that means change is on the horizon. Liverpool are going to have to move players on, say goodbye to legends and also players who they perhaps might not want to sell but have to because of the way the club operates.

This goes for the likes of Jarell Quansah or Tyler Morton last summer. Liverpool probably would have preferred to keep them. But they were able to sell them for a big profit which allowed the Reds to spend a jaw-dropping £450m in the summer window.

It has left Liverpool a little bit short in the homegrown department though. And another England youth international is not going to help things either.

Liverpool's academy has a number of exciting talents in their ranks. At England U15 level the Reds have the record-breaking Luca Eden, who is already drawing comparisons to Steven Gerrard.

At England's U16 side there's Josh Abe, Vincent Joseph and Shadrach Ekiugbo.

Meanwhile, England's U17 side has recently called-up Erik Farkas and Liam Balmer.

Usually, the players representing the Three Lions tend to be the most talented ones in the academy. So that's why it's a surprise that Liverpool are letting the aforementioned Balmer go.

According to Scousers Rising, Balmer is set to leave Liverpool at the end of the season. His contract had expired at the club and he had not been offered a scholarship deal according to our understanding.

This is a huge surprise because Balmer is a talented player. He plays as a tenacious full-back who even caught the eye on England international duty.

Now that his chapter comes to an end at Anfield, he's probably not going to be short of suitors. A player of his talent definitely is good enough to go onto have a great career in the game.

But for Liverpool, it's a surprise choice. Especially because they've had to play Alvin Ayman out of position all season at U18 level as a left-back, which is a role Balmer could have easily played.

Sure, there is a talented left-back in Cam Williams coming through the ranks who has had a terrible luck with injuries this season, but who is very highly rated having even trained with Scotland's senior team as a 16-year-old, but competition is always nice.

Letting Balmer go could prove to be a big mistake by Liverpool.