Written by Han Bing From the meeting of Liverpool's senior management with the Wirtz team at Blackpool Airport on May 13 to the confirmation of a transfer agreement between Liverpool and Bayer Leverkusen by the British media on June 13, Wirtz only needs a medical examination to join Liverpool...... The most eye-catching "big drama" in the transfer market this summer has finally come to an end after a month-long tug-of-war. Wirtz, who has a base transfer fee of 100 million pounds and a total price of 116 million pounds (about 136 million euros), has become the "three-material" bidder of Liverpool, the Bundesliga, and the Premier League, and is likely to have the title of "four-material king" with the highest transfer fee in the football market this summer.

Sporting director Hughes and manager Slote have worked together to make history for Liverpool and the Premier League. Liverpool became the 10th club in football to introduce a player with a base transfer fee of more than 100 million euros, joining the "100 million euro club" of Chelsea, Manchester City, Arsenal and Manchester United in the Premier League.

Good things are grinding, and January is done

For Liverpool, the transfer of Wirtz is a month-long "long war". Although a number of clubs have previously been interested in the German star, the German media before May generally believed that Wirtz was none other than Bayern. But Manchester City's sudden entry into the fray in mid-May gave Liverpool hope. On May 13, Manchester City invited Wirtz's father, Hans Wirtz, mother Karin Gross and his agent to visit the Blue Moon Club, but in fact, the Liverpool hierarchy "cut off" at Blackpool Airport and met with Wirtz's parents, officially joining the race for Wirtz.

Soon, based on the high transfer fee, Manchester City voluntarily withdrew from the competition, and Bayer's willingness and Bayern's slowness made the German "Southern King" lose the possibility of introducing Wirtz. After Bayern President Heiner publicly admitted on May 24 that Wirtz preferred to join Liverpool, the most expensive "recruitment war" in Liverpool's history was only a repeated game with Bayer Leverkusen.

Liverpool boss Slott personally went out to explain Liverpool's new season and medium- and long-term team building strategy to Wirtz's father and agent, Hans, and convinced the Wirtz family that the reigning Premier League champions were the ideal career future for Wirtz. Slot is convinced that Liverpool will build the team with Wirtz as the core of the front line, and the German attacker will be Liverpool's standard-bearer when Salah and Virgil van Dijk fade out of history.

Of course, the Fenway Group, which has invested heavily in modernizing its training center in recent years, has also played an important role. Wirtz, who experienced Liverpool's AXA training centre in November last year, was impressed by Liverpool's modern, high-tech training facilities and rehabilitation team, compared to Bayern's training base, which has hardly changed for decades. In fact, an important factor in his rejection of Bayern was the backwardness of the German giants' training and rehabilitation facilities and teams, which made him seriously skeptical of Bayern's ability to prevent injuries and improve their competitive condition.

Although Bayer Leverkusen, who are "odd goods", have been making public offers of up to 150 million euros, Liverpool sporting director Hughes has never considered accepting such a premium from the beginning of negotiations. Hughes started with a base transfer fee of 100 million pounds, and the floating clause gradually increased, and even proposed to use players to convert part of the transfer fee. The floating clause starts at £10 million and increases in increments of £2 million until the two sides agree on the principle of the total transfer fee on 12 June, and the day after that, the specific composition of the floating clause and the payment of the transfer fee are finalised. As transfer expert Fabrizio Romano and numerous British media outlets have said, June 13 is a landmark moment in the history of Liverpool, the Premier League and the Bundesliga.

"Mr. 100 million" is not a big gamble

After the transfer contract was fully agreed, Wirtz is about to end his leave this week and arrive in Liverpool for a medical examination and signing. With a base transfer fee of 100 million pounds (about 117 million euros), it is narrowly behind Chelsea's Enzo (121 million euros) by 4 million euros, and it is not currently the Premier League's all-time top signing. However, the £16 million floating clause includes a number of easy things to achieve, and Wirtz only needs to achieve one of them during his time at Liverpool to surpass Enzo as the all-time Premier League champion. Therefore, there is no problem in acquiescing to Wirtz as the all-time Premier League standard.

In terms of salary, German media claimed that Wirtz earned 12 million euros a year at Liverpool, which is about 195,000 pounds a week. Although it is only half of Salah, who has just renewed his contract, and the gap with Van Dijk (350,000 pounds) is not small, it has exceeded the first-line weekly salary of Robertson, McAllister, Alisson and other absolute mainstays, ranking third in the team. Based on individual performance and team results, Wirtz can earn up to 15 million euros a year, which is equivalent to a weekly salary of 245,000 pounds. For Liverpool, who strictly control the total salary of the first team and adhere to the Premier League's Financial Fair Play Act, this is the best personal treatment that can be given.

However, Wirtz valued Liverpool's medium- and long-term team building strategy with him at its core, so he rejected Bayern and Manchester City's higher salary offers. Manchester City are said to have offered £350,000 a week, but the Blues' potential financial fair play bill violations have left the Wirtz team with a major concern for the player's future. In the end, Wirtz opted for Liverpool, which had a lower salary. Hughes also promised that if Wirtz performs well, Liverpool will soon give him a big salary increase to renew his contract, making him a real top salary superstar in the Premier League.

Following the signing of Virgil van Dijk for £75 million in the summer window nine years ago, this is a rare "all-or-nothing bet" for Liverpool in the ball market. After all, Liverpool not only did not have "Mr. 100 million" before, but even the transfer fee of more than 50 million euros was only 6 people in total. Liverpool has always had a tradition of making heavy investments and rarely missing out, with Torres, who was introduced 18 million euros ago, Van Dijk, who was introduced eight years ago, Alisson, who was brought in seven years ago as a goalkeeper, and Sadio Mane and Salah, who were once in the top three in the team's all-time transfer fee rankings, were all very successful.

The British media also generally believes that compared with Carroll, Benteke and Nunez who are not fully capable of center-forwards, Wirtz, who can play almost any position in the frontcourt, should be able to become another successful top-level recruitment deal for Liverpool like Torres and Van Dijk, who have also set a transfer fee record in team history.