Bayern Munich chief confirms that 'talks ongoing' for Liverpool 'target' Dayot Upamecano

The president of a European rival has revealed they are in talks with a player linked with Liverpool.

The Reds are said to be among the clubs monitoring the situation of Dayot Upamecano of Bayern Munich. The centre-back sees his contract at the Allianz Arena expire at the end of the season and is able to sign a pre-contract with teams outside of Germany from January to join as a free agent.

Upamecano has spent the past four-and-a-half years at Bayern after being signed from Red Bull Leipzig. With his current deal heading towards a conclusion, the France international is said to be on the radar of several clubs. Liverpool are one of those, as well as Real Madrid.

However, Bayern president Herbert Hainer says that discussions are ongoing with Upamacano. Via Abendzeitung reporter Maximilian Koch on X, Hainer said: "The talks are ongoing, Max Eberl and Christoph Freund are leading them. And of course, I hope that Dayot will remain with us for a long time."

Speaking on Upamacano and Bayern centre-half partner Kim Min-jae, Joshua Kimmick previously said: “It’s great that both are extremely quick and are very strong in duels. Both make very smart decisions in their duels with the opposing players. That helps us a lot.”

Konate future uncertain

Liverpool could be interested in Upamacano as a potential replacement for his France team-mate Ibrahima Konate. The Reds defender has entered the final year of his Anfield contract and he’s yet to commit his future. There have been suggestions that Konate is keen to move to Real Madrid on a free transfer in the summer.

The 26-year-old’s performances for Liverpool this season have come under scrutiny. He has started every Premier League game so far and picked up a quad problem in the 2-1 loss against Chelsea last Saturday.

Asked about Konate’s form before the game, Reds head coach Arne Slot said: “What I think is if you are losing a game of football, as we did against Galatasaray and against Palace, then it doesn't help if you lose a ball a few times very easily. He has been one of them, definitely not the only one because against Galatasaray I think apart from the penalty they created three or four moments and all three or four from us losing a very simple ball without any pressure, which happened to him once in the Crystal Palace game and once against Galatasaray.

“If you then lose a game of football, there's so much focus on that moment and then all of a sudden [the] 90 minutes have been very, very poor, which is not the way I analyse a game. Especially not afterwards where I have the time to analyse, to watch it one more time, and see what we did well and what we did wrong. In the last two games, it has been obvious and clear we've made a few errors, not only him but also others, that we're not used to. If you do things people are not used to and you lose a game of football then normally he, other ones and the manager gets criticised.”

Liverpool are likely to be in the market for a centre-back next summer, at the earliest, having missed out on signing Crystal Palace’s Marc Guehi. The England international’s move to Merseyside collapsed on summer transfer deadline day. Giovanni Leoni was recruited for £26 million from Parma but is set to be sidelined for at least a year after rupturing his ACL on his debut last month.