In a sudden turn of events and surprising news for the Liverpool faithful, reports are coming in that manager Arne Slot actually wanted to keep Luis Diaz for longer at the club by giving him a new contract in the summer. However, looks like Richard Hughes, the sporting director at the helm, initiated the sale of Luis Diaz. Arne Slot really didnโt want to let Luis Diaz go, but Richard Hughes pushed for the sale. In the end, Diaz left for Bayern Munich over the summer. Now heโs doing well in Germany and looks like the moveโs working out for him at least, as Liverpool struggle without him.
Arne Slot and Luis Diaz
Luiz Dias was truly world-class during his time at Liverpool, and especially flourished brilliantly under Arne Slot. He had his career-best season in just the one season he played under Arne Slot for Liverpool, and you could see that they both had great camaraderie going on. The fire and hunger to perform was very visible with Diaz under Slot and consequently resulted in a great season filled with goals and, obviously, the league title. One wouldn’t necessarily brand Luis Diaz as Arne Slot’s personal favourite as the performances from Liverpool were always collective on most occasions. There were always contributions coming from all directions last season, which is a very good reason they won the Premier League.
It was quite shocking, because of all this, to watch Luis Diaz leave for Bayern Munich in the summer window. Very, very shocking, actually. Especially when you consider the fact that Liverpool had just won the league, and Diaz was undoubtedly one of the best players in the squad.
The disagreement between Arne Slot and Richard Hughes
Richard Hughes took up the unforgiving responsibility of becoming Liverpool’s sporting director in the 23/24 season. I mention it being unforgiving because being the sporting director of a football club can put you in difficult situations. Hughes probably was stuck in one of those situations regarding this Diaz transfer. As it is still shocking as to how they let go of such an integral attacking facet of their team.
Reportedly, Arne Slot and Richard Hughes had a proper disagreement regarding the transfer. Arne Slot wanted to keep the Colombian, but the obstacle obstructing the move was a new bumper contract. Liverpool had to present Luis Diaz with a brand new bumper contract in order to keep him at the club. And Hughes was having none of it, as he felt it was nowhere near valuable to hand Luis Diaz a big contract.
The decision became even stronger when the German giants, Bayern Munich, came in with an extremely attractive offer for Luis Diaz. The offer was close to ยฃ70 million. The offer was probably too good for Hughes to simply put away, especially with their net spend exceeding limits. All of this contributed to Liverpool eventually selling the Colombian, a decision they regret to this day, and a decision Arne Slot would probably regret for a very long time.
Conclusion
The regret would be extremely strong right now, especially because of the way Liverpool have been playing in recent times. As the Reds started off their season extremely strongly, they are now struggling to get a single victory as they have fumbled to 9 losses in 12 games. That is unacceptable for Liverpool’s standards, and the pain gets further strong because of how Luis Diaz has been performing for Bayern. Diaz is having a career-best season with the Bavarians, with goals and assists flowing in abundance for the Colombian. This transfer decision will truly remain a massive mistake committed by the Liverpool decision makers.
