I’m a towering midfielder on Liverpool’s radar – but Everton could sign me instead

The rumours linking a towering midfielder making waves in the Bundesliga with a move to Liverpool started up towards the end of last year – just whispers, at first, but stories suggesting that Arne Slot was interested in striking a deal for one of Germany’s most imposing players have never quite gone away. Now, however, the rumour mill has thrown several other Premier League teams into the mix, including cross-city rivals Everton.

Merlin Röhl is, in many ways, not the kind of midfielder the top flight’s biggest sides usually go for. He’s no great technician, his first touch is heavy by elite standards, he isn’t a great passer or creator and he’s scarcely any kind of goal threat at all – but despite his deficiencies, he is undeniably effective.

So who is Röhl, why are teams ranging from Liverpool and Newcastle to Everton and Crystal Palace said to be interested, and will he really move to the Premier League this summer?

Why Liverpool, Everton, Newcastle and others want to sign Merlin Röhl

The 22-year-old Röhl, who is still playing with Germany’s Under-21s, is not the most elegant midfielder you will ever see. Neither nimble nor blessed with the silken touch of many Premier League players, he is nevertheless carving out an impressive career for himself with SC Freiburg.

Röhl’s ability to ascend the career ladder in the Bundesliga has had less to do with the technical profile of the modern game but everything to do with how effective he is in a high press. Röhl probably won’t carve your team apart with precise through-balls, but he will make keeping possession exceptionally challenging.

A huge presence at 6’3” and blessed with sufficient speed and energy to launch himself around the pitch in search of the ball, Röhl is fast becoming a turnover specialist, hurrying players up, picking up interceptions and judging his tackles well – although he seldom lunges in, he has succeeded with over 80% of his tackles in the league this year.

Teams that want to keep the pitch compact and play midfielders press from first whistle to last will see the apotheosis of the genre in Röhl. He’s the ball-winning midfielder writ large (literally), with every attribute relevant to winning possession back dialled up to 11 and everything else, perhaps, set aside as an afterthought.

A team like Newcastle, for instance, that condense space and ask their midfielders to play from box to box with boundless energy, could easily find a use for a player like Röhl. Liverpool seem like a slightly stranger fit at first glance, but Slot still appreciates physicality and energy in midfield, and it’s their name that has come up the most in the gossip columns.

Will Röhl move to the Premier League this summer?

Röhl makes the most sense in a team which plays with a compact midfield three. In a two-midfielder set-up, like that employed by Crystal Palace (who have been linked along with Newcastle and Liverpool in a recent article by Bild), Röhl’s habit of roving to find the ball and get to work would leave gaps that won’t be easily filled, although Palace perhaps do make the pitch small enough to make it work. It certainly seems to work with Adam Wharton, although his ball retention skills certainly exceed Röhl’s.

The connection to Everton, then, makes a certain amount of sense. It’s German media outlet Kicker who suggested that David Moyes was keen, and certainly one can take a slightly stereotyped view of Moyes’ playing style and see why a rugged bruiser like Röhl would appeal, and the Toffees’ physical version of a midfield triangle surely has space for him.

Still, it’s Liverpool’s name that has been mentioned the most in dispatches by some distance, and there is so much smoke that one imagines that there must, at least, be a small fire. Something about Röhl has caught the Reds’ attention, and while that doesn’t guarantee a bid, it hardly puts one outside of the realms of possibility.

According to Bild, Freiburg would want around €25m (£21.3m) for Röhl. That seems a little high, given that he has yet to develop a truly well-rounded playing style, and also because Röhl hasn’t necessarily taken any big forward strides this season – metaphorically anyway. Literal big forward strides have happened in abundance.

Röhl hasn’t developed his technical or passing skills very far (indeed, he is completing fewer passes and creating fewer shooting chances than he did last season) and there are injury worries to contend with, too.

He has just 11 starts and 16 total appearances in the Bundesliga this season thanks to a ligament tear in September and, more recently, a heel injury. Those issues have interrupted his progress and development and throw a few question marks up against a player whose physical conditioning will be integral to his success moving forward.

It may be that the German media are getting a little overexcited linking four Premier League clubs with a move, but there is surely some genuine interest in a prospective midfield battering ram – just don’t be shocked if he ends up being of more interest to a club like Everton than a title contender like Liverpool, or if his price tag ends up being a little lower given the undeniable red flags. Röhl has a lot to offer the right club, but whether he finds that club this summer is still unclear.