So much for keeping your cards close to your chest. When new Liverpool boss Andoni Iraola was asked recently where he needed to strengthen, he replied: ‘We definitely need to sign a winger.’
When you have to replace one of the greatest players in your club’s history in Mo Salah, and your out-and-out right-wing options during a pre-season tour of the US are Kieran Morrison, 19, and Joshua Abe, 16, there’s not much point pretending otherwise. Especially when the new guy in charge is renowned for his fast, direct, attacking style of football.
Liverpool know the man they want to fill that obvious hole, too. As Daily Mail Sport reported over the weekend, the club are working on a deal to sign 23-year-old winger Bradley Barcola from Paris Saint-Germain.
PSG, however, want around £140million for the France international, which would smash the British record of £125m Liverpool forked out for Alexander Isak last summer.
A fair old whack for a player who’s stalled over a new contract, told PSG he wants to leave, and had fallen down the pecking order under Luis Enrique anyway, with Desire Doue and Khvicha Kvaratskhelia his preferred wide options during the business end of the Champions League. So, you imagine there might be some wriggle room.
Yet this is also the young star who, essentially, replaced Kylian Mbappe on PSG’s flank when he joined Real Madrid two years ago. Club legend Javier Pastore has said Barcola could reach Mbappe’s level one day, too.
Even though his minutes became limited, Barcola ranked behind only team-mate Ousmane Dembele and Monaco’s Ansu Fati for expected goals and assists per 90 minutes in Ligue 1 last season. In other words, he’s a chance-creating machine.
Liverpool are being quoted around £140m – a Premier League record fee – to sign PSG winger Bradley Barcola
Barcola replaced Kylian Mbappe on PSG’s flank when he joined Real Madrid two years ago – and club legend Javier Pastore has said he could reach Mbappe’s level one day, too
Barcola played in all eight of France’s games at the World Cup, starting four of them. He scored three goals and set up another.
His speed, tricks and flicks on the ball won him the nickname la sauterelle, or the grasshopper, as he came through the ranks at Lyon, though he was never one of those generational wonderkids pegged for superstardom from the moment they kick a ball.
‘He was a normal kid, he never played above his age category, never jumped a stage,’ Lyon’s former academy manager Jean-Francois Vulliez once told Sky Sports. ‘His maturation was a normal process.’
Barcola joined Lyon, an academy famed for producing players like Alexandre Lacazette, Rayan Cherki and Karim Benzema, aged eight after being spotted playing in an indoor tournament for hometown club AS Buers Villeurbanne.
One of six siblings, Barcola’s brother Malcolm, a goalkeeper, also played for Lyon. His mum played when she was younger, too. ‘It’s rare but she’s the one who gave us the passion,’ Bradley once said.
Barcola and his brother watched clips she had filmed of their matches in the living room and, at weekends, his dad would take them to the local stadium to practise.
‘My father made Bradley do specific work in front of goal, and me, as a goalkeeper… he made me work too,’ Malcolm told Le Progres. ‘We complemented each other well.’
Barcola has six goals in 28 caps for France since making his debut in 2024
He scored three goals at the World Cup, including one against England in the third-place play-off
And yet it so nearly didn’t happen. Barcola’s career was stalling at Lyon under Laurent Blanc.
He was struggling to break into the first team and his coaches at the time could see he wasn’t putting the effort in during training, nor scoring the goals to justify his selection. In January 2023, he came close to being sent out on loan to Swiss side St Gallen.
But they just felt there was something there. And when team-mate Karl Toko Ekambi stormed down the tunnel after being substituted, was jeered by the fans, filmed booting a rubbish bin in fury, and never played for the club again, Barcola’s chance came.
He scored five goals and set up nine more in the back end of the 2022-23 season, including the winner at the Parc des Princes against a PSG side that would spend £40m on the then 20-year-old that summer.
You can see why Liverpool think he’s the right fit, too. For a start, he’s rapid. Barcola was the fifth quickest player in the Champions League last season and the seventh fastest at the World Cup.
Raw pace, especially across the forward line, is something Liverpool sorely lack.
Iraola has always wanted his teams to get the ball forward as quickly as possible.
Bournemouth mustered the most direct attacks of any team last season, the joint-most goals from counter-attacks and, across Iraola’s entire reign, attacked the fastest (1.95 metres per second) of all Premier League sides while averaging the second-fewest passes per sequence. Barcola’s pace would be a huge weapon.
It’s not just his runs in behind, either. One of Barcola’s favourite tricks is to knock the ball past his defender from a standing start and then leave him for dead, or even to race back to his own goal to collect the ball, then take a touch, turn his man and go in the blink of an eye.
Nor is he just a chalk-on-your-boots wide man, which also plays into the Iraola plan. Barcola would often drift into the channels to allow PSG’s stampeding full backs to provide the width ahead of him.
Having played as a striker until the age of 17, Barcola has always had a nose for goal.
Barcola boasted, by some distance, the most shot-ending carries per 90 minutes of anyone in Ligue 1. Despite only playing 1,750 minutes, his total of 40 put him behind only Mason Greenwood (43), who played nearly 2,500 minutes.
His 1.9 chances created from open play per 90 minutes also put him behind only team-mates Dembele and Lee Kang-In across the league.
He can play on both wings, as he did in each leg of their Champions League last 16 demolition of Chelsea, and often found himself taking up central positions.
The screengrabs below come just before he scored in both legs, with his full backs high up the pitch in wide areas.
Barcola took up a central position on the shoulder of Chelsea’s right-sided centre back Wesley Fofana before opening the scoring in their Champions League tie in March
He repeated the trick in the second leg, drifting in from the right this time much to the concern of left centre back Jorrel Hato
His combined touch map (below) from PSG’s entire successful Champions League campaign shows just how central he often played.
Barcola’s combined touch map for Champions League matches in 2025-26 reveals how often he drifted inside
And even in Ligue 1, most of his shots and goals came from central positions inside the penalty area.
He carries the goal threat and positional nous of a conventional striker.
Barcola’s shots (white) and goals (red) in Ligue 1 in 2025-26 (the bigger the circle, the bigger the chance in terms of xG)
That, too, would fit into Iraola’s usual style. Flying full backs were a crucial part of Bournemouth’s tactical plan. In the 2024-25 season, before his move to Liverpool last summer, Milos Kerkez was one of the most attacking defenders in the division.
Iraola has a track record of getting the best from his wingers, who play more as inside forwards.
Antoine Semenyo flourished under him before joining Manchester City. He worked wonders with Isi Palazon at Rayo Vallecano.
In Barcola, he could inherit another. This one, however, might just cost a bit more.
