Liverpool announce fan favourite will leave the club after not being offered a new contract

1. Liverpool have announced another club stalwart is set to leave Merseyside this summer.

Liverpool have revealed that another long-serving player is set to leave Merseyside this summer. Sunday’s Premier League match against Wolverhampton Wanderers will not only mark Jurgen Klopp’s final game as manager after a nine-year tenure but will also be Joel Matip’s last appearance for the club.

The centre-back, who has been with Liverpool for eight years, will bid farewell to Anfield in the same fixture.

Liverpool have announced that Joel Matip, a key figure in their recent successes, will depart this summer. Sunday’s Premier League match against Wolverhampton Wanderers will mark both Jurgen Klopp’s final game as manager and Matip’s last appearance for the club.

Matip was one of Klopp’s initial signings, joining on a free transfer from Schalke at the end of the 2015-16 season. Over eight years, he made 201 appearances, scored 11 goals, and secured seven winner’s medals, including the Champions League and Premier League titles.

Klopp praised Matip on the club’s website: “In all the years that I have been involved in football, I am not sure I have come across too many players who are more loved than Joel Matip. I’m not even sure it would be possible to say anything bad about him.

A wonderful professional, a wonderful footballer, and a wonderful human being – we have been blessed to have him with us for as long as we have and now all we can do is wish him well as he heads off in a new direction.”

Klopp added, “Joel’s qualities as a player are there for all to see and as a club we have benefited from them since the first moment that he joined. I don’t think he has had too many headlines over the years but he has only ever been a very famous figure within our group. I have said before that if there was one person who wouldn’t care if he was underrated it would be Joel, but the truth is we could not have rated him more highly. Not only has he set the standards for himself, he has set them for others and this is one of the main reasons why his time here has been so successful.”

Reflecting on a standout moment, Klopp said, “If I had to choose one moment from his time here it would definitely be his assist for Divock Origi at the Champions League final in Madrid. This was the touch that detonated an explosion in the LFC family. What a moment. What a player. We wish Joel and his family the very best for the future.”