Jurgen Klopp spotted something in one Sheffield United player remarkably early | OneFootball

Former Liverpool manager proved why he'd made it to the top of the game with an extremely prescient realisation about former Blade Ben Brereton-Diaz.

The former Liverpool manager expressed an early interest in the Sheffield United star Ben Brereton Diaz at the start of the striker's career which could have completely changed the direction it ended up taking.

The differences between players at the top end of the professional game can often be razor-thin. Whether one specific player makes it to the very elite level of the club game can often turn on a touch of luck here or there; an injury, a run of form, or catching the eye of a manager at exactly the right moment.

Now 27 years of age, Sheffield United's Ben Brereton-Diaz is now reaching the peak years of his career. Brereton-Diaz is at Bramall Lane on loan from Southampton, and it's the third time that he's been at Sheffield United on loan.

But while the English-born Chilean international has already had an eye-catching career, things might even have been better for him still, had the early interest of one of the defining managers of the last ten years in football in England come to anything.

Jurgen Klopp almost made Ben Brereton-Diaz a Liverpool player in 2017

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Ben Brereton-Diaz was still known as Ben Brereton when he first caught the eye of the then-Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp at the start of 2017.

He'd already taken a slightly roundabout route to be signed by Nottingham Forest. Born in Stoke-on-Trent to an English father and a Chilean mother, he started his journey at seven years of age in the youth set-up at Manchester United before returning to his hometown club Stoke City in 2013, at the age of fourteen.

But Brereton continued to catch the eye of other clubs, and in 2015 he signed for Nottingham Forest after being released by Stoke. Dropped into their youth team, by the start of 2016 he was in their under-23s even though he was only 16 years of age, and it was playing for Forest against Liverpool in the Fifth Round of the FA Youth Cup that year that he drew Klopp's attention.

Liverpool won that match 2-1, but Klopp was sufficiently impressed by Brereton to contact the Forest academy director Gary Brazil to inquire personally about the potential availability of the striker.

He wasn't the only high-profile manager to be interested in him, either. Although Brereton had left Manchester United more than three years earlier, The Sun reported at the start of 2017 that United, who by this time were managed by Jose Mourinho, could also be interested in taking him back.

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2016-17 was a dream season for Ben Brereton, who turned 17 years of age in April 2017. At the time, the young striker looked like one of the hottest young properties around, having scored 15 goals in 20 appearances that season for the Forest under-23s.

He made his debut for Forest on the 25th January 2017 as a substitute against Leeds United, having signed a new contract at The City Ground on New Year's Eve. On the 4th February, he scored his first goal for them in injury-time to give them a 2-1 win against Aston Villa in the Championship. But while he ended the 2016-17 season as the Championship's Apprentice of the Year, no move for the player came from Anfield, and that summer he signed his first senior contract with Nottingham Forest instead.

His form also earned his first call-up for England, being selected for their squad for the 2017 UEFA Under-19 European Championships. In the group stage, he scored the winner against the Netherlands and twice against Germany, and he was a second-half substitute during England's win against Portugal in the final.His total of three goals made him the tournament's joint-top goalscorer.

Ben Brereton-Diaz has gone on to have a successful career as a professional, but he's never quite got to scale the heights of his breakthrough season with Nottingham Forest, and it wouldn't be England that he would end up representing as a full international, either.

He first realised that he was eligible to play international football for Chile after playing the Football Manager video game and, as he assumed his mother's maiden name as part of his surname, a group of fans began a social media campaign to get him selected for the South Americans in May 2021. He's since gone on to make 42 appearances for his adopted international country, scoring ten goals for them.

And at a club level, while the mega-clubs never came calling, he's managed to carve himself out a solid career in the Championship, the Premier League and La Liga. He left Nottingham Forest for Blackburn Rovers in 2018, and it would be here that he'd have his biggest success so far as a club player, scoring 36 goals in two Championship seasons, before going to play in Spain for Villareal, and then Southampton.

His third loan spell at Sheffield United began in August, and the striker will be hoping to score the goals to get the Blades back to the Premier League. Jurgen Klopp may never have returned with a call to take Ben Brereton-Diaz to Anfield, but there's still time for him to prove himself in the top-flight if he can get himself back into the Premier League.