At Liverpool on Tuesday night, the contract cases of Mohamed Salah, Trent Alexander-Arnold and Virgil van Dijk will hang in the Anfield sky – but there will be another high-profile figure soon to be out of contract to impress.
Jonathan David may already be in the shop window, but Lille's big performance against the Reds in the Champions League will have everyone talking about him.
As this window has shown, centre-forward is one of the hardest positions to buy a player, but he is a striker in his prime years, entering the final six months of his career – and in the form of his career.
The past calendar year has been an exceptional one for the Canadian striker, with only three players – Salah, Harry Kane and Kylian Mbappe – scoring more goals and assists than David, who turns 25 on January 14.
Averaging a goal contribution every 86 minutes, David has an obsession with putting the ball in the net. This is his main characteristic, according to one of his former bosses.
“Since I've been a coach, and I've been a coach since 2008, he's the player who impressed me the most. He's an unbelievable player,” former Lille coach Jocelyn Jorvenec said. Sky Sports.
“He's always focused on his job, on his game, scoring goals. No one can disturb that. He's always focused, very calm, very focused.”
“He loves football, and he loves training.” That was evident during Jorvenec's season in charge of defending Ligue 1 champions Lille in the 2021-22 season.
David was the team's talisman with 22 goals that season. But, despite his status, he refused to take a day off.
David has scored four goals in the Champions League so far this season
One day after playing 90 minutes of a Ligue 1 match that season, the striker was asked to undergo a recovery session with players who were only on the bench or did not participate in the match due to training.
But there was David with his boots on, on the training pitch, ready to go. the reason? Desire to register.
“He came and said: 'I want to train,'” Jorvenek added.
“I let the staff talk to him and there were some problems because he didn't agree with the decision to play 90 minutes yesterday so he couldn't train that morning.
“It was because in four days, we had another game. I don’t understand it,” he said. I'm fit, I was fit yesterday. “And I have to train because I have to score goals. The coach has a player like him.”
Since Jorvenec's season at Lille with David, the Canadian striker has scored 26 goals in each of his two full seasons with Lille.
With 17 goals in 30 games so far this season, he is likely to reach or even exceed that number again.
Most of his goals come from inside the penalty area, which is the area of the pitch where he thrives. There is a sense of right place, right time with David, especially on the biggest stage.
A lot of David's goals come from shots into the penalty area
His four goals came in the Champions League against Atletico Madrid, Juventus and Real Madrid.
“He's very good in front of goal in the penalty area to keep calm and control the ball, and he doesn't always look for power,” Gurvenec said of David's finishing skills.
“Goals from a meter away at the back post. Yes, even I can score them so it's easy. But Jonathan's case is that he's always alone in these situations – and then the ball comes to him like a magnet. In the penalty area, he always finds those spaces, it's like a science.” “The game.”
But scoring goals is not the only aspect of David's game. Three seasons ago, the striker failed to provide a single assist in the 2021-22 season.
But since then, he has registered 20 assists in the last two and a half seasons.
“He always plays for the team, loves to score, but he is always happy when he can help his teammate,” Jorvenec said.
“He hits 12 kilometers per game, those numbers are like a midfielder. He always has high intensity efforts.
“Every three or four days, when you have to play two games a week, it's not a problem for him because he has a high level of recovery.”
David is fourth in goalscoring in 2024
Judging by all that skill – and the goals that followed – it's hard to believe why David wasn't picked up sooner.
After all, his talents have been well documented for some time. It has been four years since he led Lille to the Ligue 1 title in 2021.
But there is interest from all over Europe. At least four Premier League clubs are understood to be keen on a 2025 move for the striker, with Chelsea and West Ham both announcing interest last summer.
“He did not want to stay for a long time, but the club did not open the door for him,” Gurvenec added. “Now he is in a good position where he can make his decision.
He added: “The club did not want him to leave. This was not his decision, but he respected that and respected the other players on the team.”
And when David heads to Anfield on Tuesday evening, it may not be his last game at a Premier League stadium. “I don't know if I could find myself anywhere other than the Premier League,” the striker said in 2022.
English fans may have to get used to David defending.
