Pep Lijnders Expects Kaide Gordon to Make Impact for Liverpool

With Kaide Gordon having been left out of the squad for Liverpool’s U23 match against Leeds on Sunday, the 16-year-old forward is expected to be handed his senior debut for the club on Tuesday evening against Norwich City.

The highly regarded youngster joined the Reds from Derby County at the start of 2021 in a deal worth between £1M and £3M and was one of the standouts early in pre-season when given the chance to train and play with the first team.

“I went to watch the U23s training and I see one player and he has fire in each moment he touched the ball,” said assistant manager Pepijn Lijnders of the young winger catching the eye of Liverpool’s coaches over the summer.

“He was passing players like they are not standing there, so I called Jürgen immediately like, ‘Wow, we have a new player here.’ All our [first team] invited him in our group and that made it good for him, to help adapt to our team and our style.”

Gordon, who joined Derby at the age of nine, made his senior debut in December of 2020 as a second half substitute against Birmingham City in the Championship. Just a little more than a month after that, he joined Liverpool.

On Tuesday, it will be a surprise if he isn’t in the starting eleven on the right of Liverpool’s attacking three, with Lijnders and the rest of the coaching staff believing he’s already ready to make an impact—and maybe to score a few goals.

“He has a goal in him and this natural ability to be in the box between the goalposts to score,” Lijnders added. “Not many [young wingers] have that. They have maybe dribbling skills but not desire to come in the box, to score.

“So in my opinion he is a typical Liverpool Football Club winger, because he has speed and he also has goals. So we really like him and we are really happy that he is with us.”