Is this AS Roma star Liverpool bound?

06 June 2013 11:34

Fans of Italian football will know the name Erik Manuel Lamela well after impressive displays for AS Roma since signing in 2011.

As a youngster Lamela grew up in the famed River Plate academy. He was highly rated even as a boy, attracting interest from Barcelona from their prestigious La Masia academy. He chose to stay with River Plate however, and develop his football knowledge.

The left footed Argentine is versatile, tricky and has bags of pace and is also comfortable playing anywhere across the front although he is mostly deployed on the right of the attacking three (a position that Stewart Downing has played in predominantly this season .... with varying results).

After settling in and having a stellar season in the Italian capital, Roma are obviously reluctant to sell their star of the future and this is why (when he returns from holiday) they want to sit down and thrash out a deal to add a further 2 years onto his existing contract to (2018).

Although back in April Goal.com, Skysports and Football Italia all reported that this wasn't the case and that there was contract extension was being arranged for Lamela.

His agent said “At this moment in time, the first contract that we signed until June 2016 is still in place.”

Lamela's current contract runs until June 2016 which is still 3 years away but the Italian's want to add another 2 years to this to ward off any potential suitors for the Argentine International.

Despite Roma's current reluctance to sell, Liverpool are still thought to be confident that a bid of €25m (£21m) would be enough to convince the Italian's to let him leave the Stadio Olimpico.

In terms of how Liverpool's attacking line could looks next season:

With Suarez:

LF: Suarez, ST: Sturridge RF: Lamela,

CAM: Coutinho.

Without Suarez:

LF: Coutinho, ST: Sturridge RF: Lamela,

CAM: Mkhitaryan.

After a quick look on youtube i found this little package of some of Lamela's goals this season enjoy and let me know what you think.

*Apologies to the earlier error Suarez name was put in twice by mistake 

Source: DSG