Liverpool's Succession Plan: First Bid for Ibrahim Mbaye

Liverpool’s Salah succession plan may finally be taking shape – and it has a very clear name.

Liverpool move towards first bid for Ibrahim Mbaye

Liverpool’s rebuild has felt bitty so far. Three signings in, plenty of noise, but still a glaring hole where Mohamed Salah once terrified full-backs on a weekly basis.

That gap has dominated the summer at Anfield. The club have shuffled parts of the squad after a poor campaign, yet the right flank remains a problem zone. Victor Munoz, Federico Chiesa and Jeremie Frimpong can all operate there, but none of them is a like-for-like heir to the “Egyptian King”, nor a long-term certainty in that role.

Now the picture is shifting.

“Liverpool should send a first offer to Paris for Ibrahim Mbaye in the coming days,” reported Loic Tanzi on his personal X account, a line that underlines a concrete move rather than loose speculation.

If that bid lands, Liverpool will be going after a profile that fits their best transfer traditions: young, hungry, and already used to the big stage.

An 18-year-old with senior pedigree

Mbaye is only 18, but his numbers already jump off the page. The winger has scored 19 goals in his career so far and has broken into the Senegal national team, where he has already collected 15 caps and four goals.

Those international returns matter. They show he is not just padding stats in low-pressure environments; he is producing for a major African nation that has no shortage of attacking talent to choose from. That kind of early maturity is exactly what Liverpool have often targeted in the past.

The timing is important too. By the time he needs to be formally registered in Liverpool’s Premier League squad, Mbaye will qualify as homegrown. That addresses one of the club’s most awkward structural problems at the moment, with registration slots and quota rules placing a hard cap on how they remodel the squad.

And then there is the market angle: Paris Saint-Germain are understood to be open to moving him on. When a club of PSG’s size is prepared to sell, and a club of Liverpool’s profile sees an opportunity, the conditions for a relatively smart deal are obvious.

A thin squad, a natural fit

Strip away the big names and the marketing gloss and Liverpool’s depth does not look as intimidating as it once did. Certain areas still boast high-end quality, but last season’s performances exposed just how far this group has to go before it can seriously hunt down major trophies again.

That is why Mbaye feels more like a strategic piece than a luxury signing.

He is a natural right-winger, comfortable in the very zone Salah has owned for years. Nobody at Anfield is under any illusion that Salah can truly be “replaced” – his 22 goal contributions across all competitions last season, even in a below-par year, underline the scale of the task. But Liverpool do need someone who can live on that touchline, attack defenders one-on-one, and grow into the responsibility of carrying a chunk of the goals burden.

Landing Mbaye would not instantly solve everything. It would, though, signal a clear direction: a younger, more dynamic front line built to evolve rather than simply hold the fort.

Liverpool have been linked with a long list of names this summer. This one, at least, looks like it fits a plan.