At Liverpool on Tuesday night, the contract situations of Mohamed Salah, Trent Alexander-Arnold and Virgil van Dijk will hang in the Anfield sky, but there will be another high-profile figure who will soon be out of contract. make an impression.
Jonathan David may already be in the shop window, but a big performance for Lille against the Reds in the Champions League will have everyone talking about him.
As this window has shown, striker is one of the toughest positions to buy a player in, but this is a striker in his prime, entering the final six months of his career – and in the form of his career.
The past calendar year has been exceptional for the Canadian striker, with only three players – Salah, Harry Kane and Kylian Mbappe – having more goals and assists than David, who turned 25 on January 14.
With an average of a goal involvement every 86 minutes, David has an obsession with putting the ball in the back of the net. According to one of his former bosses, it is his most important characteristic.
“Since I started coaching, and I have been since 2008, he is the player who has impressed me the most. He is incredible,” former Lille manager Jocelyn Gourvennec told Sky Sports.
“He is always focused on his work, on his game, on scoring goals. Nobody can disrupt that. He is always focused, very quiet, very concentrated.”
“He loves football, he loves training.” This became clear during the season that Gourvennec was in charge of reigning French champions Lille in the 2021-2022 season.
David was the talisman in the team, scoring 22 goals that season. But despite his status, he refused to take a day off.
A day after playing 90 minutes of a Ligue 1 match that season, the striker was told he would have to undergo a recovery session with only players who were on the bench or not involved in the match due to training.
But there was David with his boots on the training pitch, ready to go. The reason? A desire to score.
“He showed up and said, 'I want to train,'” Gourvennec added.
“I had the staff talk to him and there were some problems because he didn't agree with the decision that he had played 90 minutes yesterday and couldn't train that morning.
“It was because we had another match in four days. And he said, 'I don't understand. I'm fit, I was fit yesterday. And I have to train because I have to score goals.' It's unbelievable that a coach has such a player.”
Since Gourvennec's season at Lille partnering David, the Canadian forward has scored 26 goals in each of his two full seasons at Lille.
With 17 goals in 30 games so far this season, he is likely to reach or even surpass that number again.
Most of his goals come from inside the penalty area, the area of the pitch where he thrives. And there is a sense of right place and right time with David, especially on the biggest stage.
His four Champions League goals came against Atletico Madrid, Juventus and Real Madrid.
“He is very good at keeping the calm in front of the goal and in the penalty area, without always going for power,” said Gourvennec about David's finishing qualities.
“The goals from a meter away from the back post. Yes, even I can score them, that's easy. But the thing with Jonathan is that he is always alone in these kinds of situations. Then the ball comes to him like a magnet. he always finds those spaces. It's like a science of the game.”
But scoring goals isn't the only aspect of David's game. Three seasons ago, the attacker failed to record a single assist in the 2021/2022 season.
But he has since recorded 20 assists over the last two and a half seasons.
“He always plays for the team, he likes to score, but he is always happy when he can give an assist to a teammate,” said Gourvennec.
“Every match he covers twelve kilometers, those figures are like those of a midfielder. He always makes intensive efforts.
“Every three or four days, if you have to play two games in a week, it's not a problem for him because he has a high recovery level.”
Judging by all these skills – and the targets that followed – it's hard to believe why David wasn't arrested sooner.
After all, his talents have been well documented for some time. It has been four years since he guided Lille to the Ligue 1 title in 2021.
But there is interest from all over Europe. At least four Premier League clubs are believed to be interested in a move for the striker in 2025, with interest from Chelsea and West Ham made public last summer.
“He didn't want to stay that long, but the club didn't open the door for him,” Gourvennec said. “Now he is in a good position where he can make his choice.
“The club didn't want him to leave. It wasn't his decision, but he respected that and the other players in the team.”
And when David heads to Anfield on Tuesday evening, it may not be his last action in a Premier League stadium. “I don't know if I can find myself anywhere else than the Premier League,” the striker said in 2022.
The English public may have to get used to David taking on the defense.
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