Benfica Have Set Their Price for Schjelderup. Is It One Liverpool Should Pay?

Andreas Schjelderup’s stock has been climbing for months, and the latest reporting out of Portugal gives us the clearest signal yet of what it will actually cost to prise him away from Benfica. The number being floated is around eighty million euros, which converts to roughly sixty eight million pounds, and it is the kind of figure that turns a pleasant transfer conversation into a genuinely difficult decision.

Benfica are not negotiating from a position of weakness

Per TeamTalk, sources close to the Portuguese club say there is no pressure whatsoever to sell below that valuation, and Benfica plan to drive a hard bargain with any interested party. That posture makes sense. Schjelderup is twenty two, still has a contract running until 2028, and produced a decisive World Cup for Norway that has clearly reshaped how clubs value him. When a selling club holds both the leverage of contract length and a recent tournament to point to, they tend to get close to whatever number they are asking for.

We would also note that Liverpool are not the only side credited with interest here. Chelsea and Tottenham are both mentioned, with Spurs reportedly the more active of the two so far. That kind of competition rarely helps drive a fee down, and it tends to accelerate a deal once one of the interested parties decides to move first.

What actually makes him worth the conversation

Set the fee aside for a moment and the underlying profile is genuinely appealing. Schjelderup is naturally left sided but has shown he can operate effectively from the right too, which matters more than it sounds in a squad planning sense. A forward who can play either flank gives a manager real flexibility rather than a specialist who only solves one problem, and that versatility tends to age well across a long Premier League season.

He also ticks the boxes Liverpool have tended to look for in recent attacking recruitment, room to keep developing, resale value protection built into his age, and enough technical quality that the ceiling looks higher than the current output alone suggests. None of that guarantees he becomes the club’s next standout wide player, but it explains why the interest exists in the first place and why three separate Premier League clubs are said to be circling.

Our view

Sixty eight million pounds for a player yet to prove himself in the Premier League is a lot to ask supporters to get comfortable with, and we understand the instinct to want that money spent on a more proven, ready made option instead. But this is simply how the market for elite young attacking talent works right now. Wait too long and the price only goes up, or someone else gets there first and the conversation becomes academic.

The question Liverpool’s recruitment staff need to answer honestly is whether Schjelderup’s World Cup form was a genuine levelling up or a short, brilliant peak that flattered him. If it is the former, this fee will look entirely reasonable within a couple of seasons. If there is real internal doubt about that, then no amount of tactical fit should be enough to justify the outlay on its own.

We would rather Liverpool walk away undecided than pay elite money on hope alone. There is no shame in letting a good player go to a rival if the underlying conviction is not fully there internally, and plenty of expensive attacking signings across the league have shown exactly what happens when a fee gets paid on potential rather than certainty.