Is Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang a Realistic Transfer Target for Liverpool?
With Danny Ings suffering a season-ending ACL injury and Daniel Sturridge sidelined with a mystery knee problem, it is worth opening the debate as to whether or not Liverpool should target a new centre-forward in January—and there are few in better form in Europe than Borussia Dortmund's Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.
Predictably, following Jurgen Klopp's appointment as Liverpool manager at the beginning of October, the 48-year-old has been linked with a host of his former Dortmund players, including the Gabonese forward.
Jamie Anderson of the Star relayed word from French publication Le10sport this month, writing that "Klopp is still searching for his first win after three games in charge at Liverpool and is looking to bolster his attacking options when the transfer window reopens."
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Anderson claims that Paris Saint-Germain and Barcelona are also interested in signing Aubameyang, but "the Reds have been installed as favourites with Klopp viewed as a major attraction."
According to Transfermarkt.co.uk, Aubameyang's market value is at a career-high £24.5 million, but it is safe to assume that it would require a fee closer to £40 million to recruit the 26-year-old from Dortmund, who are thriving under Klopp's successor, Thomas Tuchel, this season.
Aubameyang is the joint-top goalscorer in Europe in 2015/16, alongside Bayern Munich's Robert Lewandowski with 13 goals—outscoring Premier League poster boy Jamie Vardy, whom ESPN FC questionably linked with a move to Liverpool this week.
But is he a realistic target for the Reds at this stage?
A prodigious young talent on the books at AC Milan, Aubameyang began his senior career being touted to various French sides, taking in loans with Dijon, Lille and AS Monaco before finding his feet at Saint-Etienne.
"All of these loans have helped me to gain experience but it isn't easy to change clubs every season," he told Ligue1.com, shortly after joining ASSE in 2011. "You have to get to know the surroundings, the staff and the players, so of course it hasn't always been easy."
Aubameyang conceded that "my objective is to seal a permanent contract with Saint-Etienne, and I'm doing everything possible to make it happen."
He will have been delighted, therefore, when the club decided to make his loan deal permanent, securing a move from Milan for just over £1 million.
At 6'1" and boasting incredible pace, Aubameyang has long possessed the raw qualities to thrive as a top-level European forward, and ASSE clearly recognised this was a talent worth developing.
The forward immediately flourished, scoring 16 goals and registering 11 assists in 36 Ligue 1 appearances, as ASSE finished seventh—just four points off a Europa League qualification spot—but it wasn't until the following campaign that Aubameyang became a widely coveted target.
Shifted between a striker's role and regular outings on the flanks, Aubameyang scored 19 goals and made another 13 in 37 league games.
"I am a more complete and mature player. I can play in the centre, on the right or the left, and I can score goals from all these positions," he told WhoScored.com's Luca Ferrato, towards the end of the 2012/13 season.
"Also, with the Gabonese national team I don’t play as a centre-forward, but behind the lone striker. In that position I can move more, and I don’t give reference points to the defenders, so I have more opportunities to score goals."
In what was to be his final season with ASSE, Aubameyang has developed into a top-level forward capable of thriving in a variety of roles, and it was to no surprise that both Arsenal and Newcastle United registered their interest in 2013, with the Mail's David Kent reporting that the Premier League sides were both seeking a £10 million deal to secure his services.
Dortmund were to be his eventual destination, however, with Aubameyang telling Ferrato prior to his £9 million move to the Westfalenstadion that "my characteristics could match perfectly with the style of play adopted by Jurgen Klopp."
With Lewandowski shining as Klopp's star centre-forward at Dortmund, however, Aubameyang struggled to impose himself in a regular wide role in 2013/14—despite scoring a hat-trick on his Bundesliga debut, in a 4-0 win away to Augsburg—with 13 goals and just four assists in 32 league appearances.
There were questions as to whether he could adapt to life under the demanding German, detailing his early woes to the Bundesliga's official website in October of last year:
"Klopp always demands that whenever we lose the ball, we try to win it back again as quickly as possible.
Tactically, I wasn't able to do what he wanted last season perfectly because I didn't understand the language and because it was a new world to me.
Now I've improved a lot in this department.
"
Later that month, Aubameyang also declared that he was "benefitting from playing as striker again," and it was not only when Lewandowski left for Munich that the Gabonese truly flourished under Klopp.
After deputising in a wide role to compensate for the absence of Marco Reus, Aubameyang was reinstated as a centre-forward on the Germany international's return in 2015, scoring 11 league goals in a 15-game stretch.
He ended the season with 16 goals and seven assists in 33 Bundesliga appearances.
Klopp had sanctioned the signings of Adrian Ramos and Ciro Immobile at the beginning of 2014/15, but it was his big-money acquisition from the previous summer that truly offset Lewandowski's departure.
Following Klopp's resignation and Tuchel's appointment, the No. 17 has not looked back, and he looks set to establish himself as one of European football's most sought-after forwards this campaign.
Intriguingly, Aubameyang's career trajectory mirrors that of Sturridge: the England international began his career as a highly rated young forward at Manchester City, before reinforcing his credentials after a move to Chelsea—where he played as both a winger and a striker—and then truly securing his top-level status on moving to Liverpool.
Aubameyang and Sturridge possess similar attributes, too.
Both are pacy, dynamic forwards who station themselves off the shoulder of defenders, utilising their speed, intelligent movement and finisher's instinct to terrorise opposition defences; both pair this vitality with a welcome physicality, with Sturridge also standing at just under 6'2"; and both are reaching their peak age at 26.
But, unlike Sturridge, Aubameyang has no significant injury record, and as such, he represents a hugely reliable option if Liverpool were to dip into the market to either replace their No. 15 or simply bolster their attacking ranks.
On paper, Aubameyang would fit into Klopp's attacking setup perfectly, with his versatility allowing him to adapt to a variety of positions in the German's currently favoured 4-3-2-1 formation.
His experience in the Bundesliga suggests that the transition to life in the physically demanding English top flight would not be an issue for Aubameyang, either.
The Dortmund forward should be one of Klopp's priority targets if he looks to add to his attack in the near future, and this would arguably coalesce with the desires of Liverpool's transfer committee—as Aubameyang was linked with the club as former Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers looked to rebuild his attack over the summer.
In May, the Mirror's Dean Jones suggested that Liverpool would turn to the Dortmund man after missing out on signing Dutch winger Memphis Depay, claiming that Aubameyang had "been on the Reds’ radar" since he left Saint-Etienne in 2013.
With Rodgers making a new centre-forward his priority in the summer, Liverpool eventually signed Christian Benteke from Aston Villa, in a deal worth £32.5 million.
Aubameyang promptly signed a new contract with Dortmund at the end of July, with the club confirming that he had been "coveted by a number of European clubs" before extending his terms to the end of the 2019/20 season.
"I'm absolutely delighted that the next years of my career will be spent at Borussia Dortmund. I feel very happy at the club, in this team and in this city. BVB has become like a second home to me. Every part of me wants to be here and I have never wanted to leave," the 26-year-old said on the announcement of his new deal, underlining his loyalty to the club.
Enjoying his best-ever season under Tuchel in 2015/16, it seems unlikely that Aubameyang would swap Dortmund for Liverpool at this stage.
Liverpool may have missed their opportunity to sign Aubameyang this summer, and Rodgers' decision to opt for Benteke instead of the Dortmund striker may leave Klopp ruing his attacking options on Merseyside.
Unfortunately, Aubameyang would have been the perfect fit.
Statistics via WhoScored.com and Transfermarkt.co.uk.
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