Having spent well over £400 million on what was largely an attacking rebuild last summer, Liverpool are still bringing fresh faces into their front line. Víctor Muñoz came in quite early on in the window, but the real headline signing came right at the end.

Bradley Barcola had been on the market all summer as he was reportedly open to a move after losing his starting spot at Paris Saint-Germain. The Champions League holders placed a very high price tag on him, exceeding budget ranges of even the likes of Bayern Munich and Barcelona. In the end, only Liverpool and Arsenal looked like serious candidates to secure his signature, and as it turns out, the former got the deal over the line in the nick of time for a reported fee of £106m, which could go up to £123m if all add-ons are triggered.

Anyone who has seen even a little of Barcola over the last couple of years will easily understand why he is such a good fit for the Reds under new head coach Andoni Iraola, but there are other factors that must be considered while assessing the transfer. While negotiations were dragging on, Liverpool have already played two Premier League matches in the new season and are yet to register a win. Signs of predictable issues are already clear in different parts of the pitch, many of which will not be mitigated by the arrival of a new left winger.

Before delving into the wider context, it is worth considering just what Barcola would bring to this Liverpool team.

Born in Lyon, the French winger spent over a decade in OL’s youth academy before breaking into the senior team as a 19-year-old in the 2021/22 season. It still took him a fair while to become a regular, but his potential was quite apparent by the end of the following campaign as he notched up 13 goal involvements in under 1,500 league minutes. Paris Saint-Germain saw enough to sign him for about €45m just as they were pivoting their approach to build a more youthful and homegrown squad in 2023. He didn’t quite set the world on fire in his first year in the capital, but did show signs of promise.

Barcola would very much explode the following season, scoring 21 goals and setting up 18 others across all competitions as PSG clinched their first Champions League title as part of a treble in 2024/25.

Still, the club had signed a direct competitor in his position in Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, who cemented his spot as the first-choice last term when he started each of the last five Champions League games. Barcola remained an important contributor as an impact substitute, a role that suited his style of play well since he thrives in open spaces and end-to-end action.

It is precisely that tendency which Liverpool will have been attracted to. Although he likes to start quite wide and attempts a high volume of take-ons, Barcola is far from a traditional touchline winger. Rather than troubling defenders with changes of speed and direction from a slow start, the Frenchman is most dangerous when hurtling at opponents at high speed. He clocked a top speed of 34.4 km/h in the Champions League last season, placing in the top 10 among all players. He shows good off-ball movement with his forward runs in particular, and has very good ball control to preserve much of his pace while carrying. Besides making diagonal runs from out to in, Barcola also likes to carry through open channels in more central areas. His quick footwork and ability to go either way make his feints effective, enabling him to get past the defenders blocking his route to goal.

Either way, the PSG winger’s most valuable trait is the consistency with which he gets into very dangerous positions to score and/or assist. He neither curls too many long-range shots into the top corner nor unlocks defences with genius passes, yet he has crossed 20 goal involvements in both of the last two seasons largely thanks to his ability to get inside the box with the ball. His 8.69 penalty box touches per 90 placed him in the 97th percentile among Ligue 1 forwards last season, and he only dropped to 7.46 and the 89th percentile in the Champions League.

Barcola was extremely unlucky not to get several Ligue 1 assists last season.

Liverpool will hope that Barcola’s directness can spearhead Iraola’s high-octane style of play. His ability to deal damage without the support of an advancing full-back may help bring some more balance into the team by enabling the left-back to stay deeper, perhaps even à la Nuno Mendes at PSG.

He ought not to be short of service or targets to find given the sheer amount of attacking quality Iraola has been packing into his early line-ups. If they can support him somewhat along the lines of how Bournemouth platformed Antoine Semenyo, then he is sure to be devastating. The Frenchman, for his part, could still get more clinical with his last actions. He could yet develop a more precise final ball, and certainly has room to improve with his left-footed shooting since he often gets into good positions but lacks control on his finishes.

I know he divides opinion among the Liverpool faithful, but I actually think Cody Gakpo is a serviceable left winger for Iraola. His output may be inconsistent, but he is able to carry infield and can create shots both for himself and others.

The Reds also had sufficient depth behind him, with Muñoz a good fit for more open game situations when a direct runner is needed, while young Rio Ngumoha showed sufficient promise last season to be trusted to get at low blocks. That latter point is a potential question mark for Barcola, especially against the much tougher set defences in England compared to France. Indeed, low blocks have already caused problems for Liverpool in the first two games of the season.

What Gakpo also offers is an ability to play off the right, as he did effectively in what might have been good last appearance for the Reds. While some clubs retire the shirt numbers of their legends, Liverpool are perhaps going a step too far by retiring Mohamed Salah’s position entirely; they have no out-and-out right wingers in their current squad (Federico Chiesa will be the only one when he returns from injury, but I had frankly forgotten about him until I pulled up their squad list).

Having waited far too long to attempt to sign Yankuba Minteh this summer, Liverpool may well have to make do with what they have for at least half a season. Muñoz, Ngumoha and Barcola can play on the right, but I dare say none of them is the most effective on that side. Pushing Jeremie Frimpong higher would be an option, but he seems to be Iraola’s first-choice right-back.

At one point, it seemed that the Barcola arrival would be offset by Gakpo’s sale to Manchester City. Despite my earlier defence of the Dutchman, I would have accepted the reported offer of £80m without thinking twice. In isolation, replacing Gakpo with Barcola for a difference of less than £50m would have been completely justifiable.

In any case, though, I maintain that Liverpool should have invested a lot more time and money in other areas of the squad this summer, as Hayden and I discussed on Patreon last week. Their defensive depth is a real matter of concern, and a budget midfield signing would not have been amiss either.

In conclusion, it would be safe to say that Barcola’s arrival raises Liverpool’s ceiling, but doesn’t do much about concerns around their consistency and squad balance. It appears that Liverpool’s decision-makers have not learnt the main lesson of 2025/26 and have once again gone overboard on attackers while neglecting other issues, so they are unlikely to get a particularly different outcome.

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