Talks held: Liverpool in contact over potential £42m swoop for attacker who Wirtz knows well | OneFootball

Liverpool have reportedly made an initial approach for a player who Florian Wirtz knows from international duty.

The Bayer Leverkusen playmaker is dominating transfer discussion among Reds supporters, with his move to Anfield ‘99% done‘ according to some German sources, and it now appears that they could also be in the race to sign one of his teammates from the national squad.

Liverpool hold initial talks over potential swoop for Nick Woltemade

According to CaughtOffside, Arne Slot’s side are among several Premier League clubs to have made contact over a potential swoop for Stuttgart striker Nick Woltemade, who made his senior Germany debut in their UEFA Nations League defeat to Portugal on Wednesday night (in which Wirtz scored).

The long list of suitors for the 23-year-old also includes Arsenal, West Ham, Brighton, Everton, Bayern Munich, Atletico Madrid, Napoli and Roma, with the centre-forward expected to fetch approximately €50m (£42.1m) for his current employers if they are to sell him this summer.

Liverpool (and all of the teams named above) have held ‘initial talks’ over a possible move for the player, and the Reds’ interest is deemed to be ‘genuine’.

(Photo by Stuart Franklin/Getty Images)

Could Woltemade be a viable summer signing for Liverpool?

At the price point quoted in the report, Woltemade could be a much more affordable alternative to some of the other strikers who’ve been linked with the Merseysiders, such as Alexander Isak and Hugo Ekitike.

That duo would have a more proven goalscoring record over time in their respective leagues, but the 6 foot 6 Stuttgart hotshot has shot to prominence since the turn of the year, scoring in each of his club’s games on their route to winning the DFB-Pokal and netting a hat-trick against Spain for Germany’s under-21s in March.

He also netted in Die Schwaben’s final three Bundesliga matches of 2024/25, ending the campaign with 17 goals in 33 appearances across all competitions (Transfermarkt).

As per FBref, he landed 50% of his shots on target during the season, a better rate than other Liverpool-linked strikers in Isak (43.2%), Ekitike (38.6%) and Benjamin Sesko (43.9%). He also recorded more shot-creating actions per 90 minutes (4.38) than his counterparts from Newcastle (3.01), Eintracht Frankfurt (3.55) and RB Leipzig (1.93).

If the Reds sell Darwin Nunez this summer – as James Pearce anticipates that they’ll do – they could well be in the market for a positional replacement. While Woltemade mightn’t necessarily be top of the wish list, his relatively modest valuation could see him emerge as a plausible transfer target for the Premier League champions.

This could be one to keep an eye on over the coming weeks, and if (as expected) Wirtz completes his move to Anfield soon, he’ll be able to provide a firsthand insight on the qualities of his Germany teammate.