LIVERPOOL were in Bilbao last night to run the rule over their £10million-rated central defender Fernando Amorebieta.
Bilbao’s 6ft 3in stopper was facing Barcelona in the first leg of Spain’s version of the Community Shield.

He has been attracting attention around Europe because so many teams want an imposing leader at the back.

While Amorebieta has yet to make his debut for Spain, he has been in the international squad and is tipped to break into the starting line-up this season. (The Sun)

After Martin Skrtel and Jamie C collided yesterday the fear must have been that we had crocked two centre backs in one incident but they should come out of the incident with only bruising. We did get to see Daniel Sanchez Ayala in Premier League action and he looked nervous, which is fair enough.

I have to admit to being a big fan of Amorebieta having watched him in action on the box a few times. He is solid and dependable and perhaps most importantly he’s a reliable figure who can generate confidence from those around him and at 24 is a good age to sign having already built up a good grounding of experience. Obviously we have three solid customers to pick from for the centre back berths but much like clubs dream of having four top notch strikers in their armoury they should also look to have a quartet of central defenders to cope with the demands of a long hard season.

I think this is one deal that Rafa may well push on with and could work out far better value for money than opting for the likes of Michael Turner.

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