The financial woes of Sporting Clube de Portugal are forcing them to contemplate selling midfield star Bruno Fernandes with Liverpool among the clubs poised, reports the Daily Mirror.
Fernandes is in blistering form with 17 goals in 33 appearances in all competitions, as well as registering eight assists as Sporting struggle to hang onto the coat-tails of the top two.
Despite losing a raft of stars last summer, including William Carvalho, Gelson Martins and Rui Patricio, the club persuaded Fernandes to stay and are being rewarded by the form of his career so far.
However, Sporting are currently €281m in debt and the sale of Fernandes would help ease that burden.
Under contract until 2023, Fernandes has a release clause of €100m but Sporting are unlikely to receive that much despite interest from AC Milan as well as the Premier League title hopefuls.
Having failed to sign Nabil Fekir from Lyon last summer, Jurgen Klopp is keen to add a playmaker to his squad. Fernandes, 24, is one of Europe’s highly-rated talents and broke into the national team in 2017, occupying the No. 10 role, scoring his only international goal so far in the 3 – 0 friendly win over Algeria before last summer’s World Cup finals.