Liverpool's Bold Moves for Munoz and Diomande in Salah Succession Plan
Liverpool have ripped up the script for their summer rebuild. Victor Munoz is already through the door. Yan Diomande could yet arrive for a fee that would shatter records.
This is what a post-Mohamed Salah transition looks like at full throttle.
Liverpool hijack Newcastle’s Munoz move
Newcastle thought Victor Munoz was theirs. Fee agreed with Osasuna: £33.3m, structured as £29m plus £4.3m in add-ons. Personal terms agreed. Agent fees agreed. A medical in the United States being lined up. The 22-year-old winger had even told Newcastle he wanted the move.
Then the brakes went on.
Over the last 24 hours of the deal, Munoz’s representatives told Newcastle to wait. Liverpool, who had never truly left the negotiating table, moved decisively. The result: Munoz signs for Liverpool in a £34.5m deal and commits to a six-year contract at Anfield.
For Newcastle, it is another painful episode in a familiar story. After missing out on Alexander Isak and Hugo Ekitike to Liverpool last summer, they are again left picking through the wreckage, trying to understand how a seemingly sealed transfer slipped away.
For Liverpool, it is ruthless business.
Munoz: versatility, pace and a manager who knows him
Munoz arrives as more than just a consolation prize in a crowded winger market. He is central to Liverpool’s plan to reshape the forward line.
A direct, rapid winger, he has primarily operated off the left for Osasuna but is comfortable on either flank and capable of playing through the middle. That flexibility was a key brief for Liverpool this summer as they looked to add different profiles around the front line and avoid last season’s injury-induced selection headaches.
Andoni Iraola’s appointment accelerated the move. The new head coach brings deep knowledge of LaLiga and of Munoz’s development. While the player is currently at the World Cup with Spain, Liverpool’s medical team flew to the United States to complete his medical, underlining how determined the club were to close the deal quickly.
Inside Liverpool, Munoz is seen as a signing who strengthens the squad without blocking the pathway of highly rated youngster Rio Ngumoha. His ability to operate in multiple roles gives Iraola more tactical levers to pull without closing doors for emerging talent.
Munoz’s pedigree is strong. He came through the youth systems at both Barcelona and Real Madrid. Carlo Ancelotti handed him his LaLiga debut for Madrid in May 2025, bringing him on for Vinicius Junior in a Clásico against Barca. A five-year move to Osasuna followed that summer, where he played 34 league games last season, scoring six goals and adding two assists.
Now he steps into a Liverpool attack that is being carefully, and expensively, reimagined.
Diomande: the £86m statement Liverpool are ready to make
Munoz’s arrival does not close the chapter on Liverpool’s pursuit of wide players. It barely turns the page.
Diomande remains their top winger target, and Liverpool have indicated a willingness to pay £86m for the RB Leipzig star. That figure alone tells its own story. It would dwarf the Premier League’s record transfer fee for a teenager, eclipsing the £58.9m Manchester United agreed to sign Leny Yoro from Lille in the summer of 2024.
Leipzig, though, are not in the mood to sell on the cheap. According to Sky in Germany, the Bundesliga club want significantly more than the £86m Liverpool are currently prepared to offer for their 19-year-old phenomenon. Their ideal scenario is simple: keep Diomande for at least another season and tie him to a new contract with a pay rise on his current £33,000-a-week deal.
It is a remarkable situation for a player whose senior career, this time last year, amounted to six starts for Leganes in a relegation campaign from LaLiga. He scored in two of those games, against Espanyol and Valladolid, and did just enough to convince Leipzig to pay €20m (£17.3m) to bring him to Germany.
The gamble has paid off in spectacular fashion.
Diomande has exploded into one of Europe’s most thrilling attacking talents. Lightning quick, unpredictable, and armed with the kind of one-v-one ability that cannot be coached, he has become a nightmare for defenders and a magnet for scouts. The biggest clubs want him. Most simply cannot afford him.
Liverpool are trying to change that equation.
A crowded race – and a soaring price
Liverpool are not alone. Paris Saint-Germain are among a cluster of elite clubs tracking Diomande this summer. Leipzig know the market and know the value of scarcity; a 19-year-old winger with that ceiling and that entertainment factor does not come around often.
The £86m Liverpool are ready to commit would already represent a huge statement in the first summer of the post-Salah era. Yet even that may not be enough. Leipzig’s stance is firm, their leverage strong, and every extra suitor only tightens their grip.
Liverpool’s interest, though, is not a passing flirtation. The plan has always been to make multiple attacking signings to compensate for Salah’s departure. Munoz is one. Diomande, if they can prise him away, would be the crown jewel.
Chiesa caught in the crossfire
All of this movement has clear consequences for those already at Anfield. Federico Chiesa sits at the centre of that uncertainty.
The Italy winger entered the summer with his Liverpool future unresolved after limited opportunities under former head coach Arne Slot, who started him just once in the Premier League last season. Iraola’s arrival offered a theoretical reset. Inside the club, there is a belief that Chiesa’s attributes fit the Spaniard’s style better than they did Slot’s.
Reality may prove harsher.
Munoz is already in. Another signing is likely in Chiesa’s preferred zone. With two years left on his contract, the 28-year-old wants to be a guaranteed starter and has interest from clubs in Italy. Right now, the path to a bigger role at Anfield looks crowded at best.
Liverpool’s new attacking era takes shape
Strip it all back and a clear picture emerges. Liverpool are not tinkering. They are rebuilding the face of their attack.
Munoz brings pace, versatility and LaLiga-hardened experience on a long-term deal. Diomande, if they can land him, would arrive as a record-breaking teenager with the raw electricity to define a new era.
Leipzig will fight to keep their star. PSG and others will not step aside quietly. Newcastle are already nursing fresh wounds from Liverpool’s sharp elbows in the market.
The only certainty is that Liverpool are moving aggressively, expensively and without sentiment as they try to answer the question that will define their next few years: who carries the torch after Salah?
