Pedro Marques: Who is the Liverpool target who sold Darwin Nunez and signed Enzo Fernandez?

Liverpool are reportedly close to agreeing a deal to bring in Benfica's technical director Pedro Marques to the club, but who is he?

As we already know, there have been changes behind-the-scenes as Liverpool have welcomed back Michael Edwards as their 'football CEO' as well as appointing AFC Bournemouth's Richard Hughes as their sporting director after Jorg Schmadtke departed the role. A new manager will come in due course too but that's a matter that won't be resolved or announced until the end of the Jurgen Klopp's tenure.

Now the latest news has revealed that the club are close to appointing Benfica's Marques who is being brought in by FSG to utilise his expertise to attract global talent. Previously, he spent six years at Sporting Lisbon before moving onto Manchester City before then taking on a higher role within the City Football Group (CFG) to cover the eight clubs they own around the world.

In terms of links to Liverpool, the Athletic claim FGS are set to appoint him in their new-look football structure - and he has ties to the club in the past. The most obvious one is that he helped with the Darwin Nunez deal which saw the Reds capture the former Benfica forward for a fee of £64m which could rise to £85m. Previously, he helped to sign Enzo Fernandez and develop youth talents such as Goncalo Ramos and Joao Neves - with the latter also being linked with a move to Anfield.

Moreover, with Benfica making around $345m (£275m/€322m) in net profit over the last six seasons from transfers he has been involved in a hugely successful period from that perspective and he is set to bring his knowledge of developing players into stars to Merseyside. He also previously worked with former director Julian Ward at Man City; Marques was a performance analyst while Ward was a scout. Of course, Ward went onto become sporting director after Edwards departed in 2022 but he then left at the end of last season.