Ibrahima Konate is set to leave Liverpool when his contract expires at the end of June, closing the door on five seasons at Anfield and leaving the club to find another experienced centre-back. The 27-year-old will go as a free agent after making 183 appearances, and his exit now looks certain.
That is why Konate is being searched now: the timing turns a long-running contract story into a finished one. Liverpool wanted to keep him, but the gap between the financial package he wanted and what the club were prepared to offer proved too wide to bridge. He earns around £150,000 a week and was seeking a sizeable rise that would have moved him closer to the club's higher earners.
Konate arrived from RB Leipzig in the summer of 2021 for £36 million and went on to help Liverpool win two League Cups and the FA Cup. He also played a major part in the club's Premier League title win this season, starting 36 of 38 league matches, even as his form dipped in the first half of the campaign. In December, after a 3-3 draw with Leeds United, Arne Slot said he had been “a bit too much at the crime scene,” a blunt reflection of the scrutiny around a defender whose best and worst moments have always been visible.
The contract impasse is harder to ignore because Konate himself sounded close to staying less than six weeks ago. After the Merseyside derby win over Everton, he said he and the club were “close to an agreement” and added that Liverpool was what he had always wanted. The club's hierarchy did not share that view and were surprised by how strongly he talked up a deal that had not actually been finalised.
There is also a human side to the season that makes his departure feel more complicated than a simple transfer decision. Konate's father, Hamady, died in the new year, and he returned from compassionate leave earlier than expected to help Liverpool through an injury crisis. He scored late against Newcastle United in front of the Kop, a goal that became his seventh and final one for the club. His farewell now lands as Liverpool prepare for a summer in which Mohamed Salah and Andy Robertson have already received emotional send-offs, making Konate the third member of the 2024-25 title-winning squad to leave as a free agent.
For Liverpool, the immediate question is no longer whether Konate will stay but whether a replacement comes before his contract runs out or after he walks away at the end of June. For a club that paid £36 million for him and got five seasons of high-level service in return, the next decision has to be quicker than the last one was.
