Cody Gakpo Silences Transfer Rumours with Outstanding Performance
Cody Gakpo didn’t just answer the transfer rumours on Friday night. He silenced them.
In a controlled, ruthless 2-0 win in Suffolk, the Dutchman ran the game, stitching Liverpool’s attacks together and reminding everyone why Andoni Iraola views him as central to this new era at Anfield. All that talk of a summer exit suddenly felt very old.
Gakpo drifted between the lines, dropped deep, then burst beyond. Every time Liverpool broke forward, he seemed to be at the heart of it, choosing the right pass, the right angle, the right moment. The scoreline reflected his influence as much as anyone’s.
And when he did look up, he kept finding Alexander Isak.
The partnership between the two is still young, but it already carries the swagger of something more established. Gakpo spoke about it with a grin afterwards, happy to lean into the chemistry that’s starting to show.
“Yeah, we will see. We always train together, and always try to get to know each other better. Hopefully we can assist each other many times. He owes me a few assists now!” he told Sky Sports, half-joking, fully confident.
On the pitch, the understanding looked anything but tentative. Gakpo created, Isak finished. Simple on paper, brutal in reality.
Isak, in the form of his life, needed just nine minutes to rip the game away from the hosts. Two chances, two goals, both laid on by Gakpo, both taken with the kind of cold precision that defines a striker who knows exactly where the net is and exactly how often he plans to find it.
That quickfire brace did more than kill the contest. It pushed the Sweden international level with his entire Premier League goal tally from last season – and he has done it in only three appearances this term. A slow burner last year, he is blazing now.
Those “nine minutes of madness” also carried a slice of club history. Isak became the first Liverpool player in over a decade to hit that particular milestone, matching a feat previously achieved by Maxi Rodriguez. Different era, different team, same ruthless streak.
Behind them on the touchline, Iraola finally had the game he needed.
After two straight 2-2 draws to open his Premier League tenure, questions had already started to circle about Liverpool’s ability to close out matches. Not a crisis, but a murmur. Could they manage a lead? Could they control a game without inviting chaos at the wrong end?
In Suffolk, the answer was firm. Liverpool were disciplined, direct when they had to be, calm when they needed to slow it down. The performance carried an edge without losing shape. The win not only delivered Iraola his first three points in charge, it also spared him an unwanted place in the club’s history books. He avoided becoming the first Liverpool manager since Brendan Rodgers to go winless in his first three Premier League games.
Inside the dressing room, the players knew what it meant. Virgil van Dijk, who marshalled things with his usual authority, pointed straight at the tactical tweak and Gakpo’s influence.
“I think we were a little bit more direct in the beginning, which is what we wanted to put the danger in their half and create a bit of chaos,” the captain said. “Great goals. Cody was outstanding. Great win, and on to the next.”
That last line matters: on to the next. Because for all the excitement around Isak’s hot streak and Iraola’s first win, the lingering subplot is Gakpo’s future. Or rather, the insistence that it remains at Anfield.
Van Dijk didn’t dance around it.
“Massive. I said it before the transfer window had closed, he's important for us, and he will be important this season.”
The club’s stance and the captain’s words are aligned. Gakpo was the architect of this victory, the link between midfield and attack, the player who turned a good plan into a winning one. Two assists for Isak, constant threat, constant composure.
He called it “a great game” and “a much-needed win” when speaking to Sky Sports, while still underlining there is room for improvement. That, in itself, is the point. If this is Liverpool with obvious areas to sharpen, what happens when Iraola’s ideas fully bed in and Gakpo and Isak grow even closer to the partnership they’re hinting at?
For now, the speculation has gone quiet. The football is doing the talking. And with Gakpo pulling the strings and Isak finishing the moves, the real question is no longer whether he leaves Anfield – it’s how far this attack can take Liverpool this season.
