Layton Stewart has signed a new deal at Liverpool.
The prolific youngster made his Liverpool under 18’s debut under Steven Gerrard in 2018 at just 15-years-old, and has scored 16 goals this season in his first full campaign under Michael Beale, including a hattrick in his final game against Sunderland.
He signed his first professional deal earlier this year before resigning after significant progress and maturity in dealing with a long-term injury.
His goalscoring record at youth level is not too dissimilar to the likes of Michael Owen and Robbie Fowler, hitting 56 in one season for the under 16’s.
This goalscoring hunger was documented as he spoke to Liverpool’s official website earlier this year:
"“If I don’t score, I don’t speak to my parents for a couple of days and I have a face on!“But if the team wins then I’m happy.“As a striker, I always want to get on the scoresheet and get my goal tally up.”"
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Jurgen Klopp mentioned a few weeks back that in ten years, he’d love it if there was a ‘team full of Scousers’.
He went to the same school as Trent Alexander-Arnold, Rainhill High, and will definitely hope to replicate his schoolmates’ career thus far.
He is certainly an example of what could be and how the nurturing of Alex Inglethorpe and the academy staff is starting to bear fruit.
Stewart is the latest in a long line of academy products committing to the Reds long-term, with Curtis Jones, Harvey Elliott and Paul Glatzel also signing long-term deals in recent months.
There is of course the other routes taken by the likes of Rafa Camacho and now Yasser Larouci to look for further first-team action, but Stewart is unlikely to be at that crossroads for two or three years.
It signals to a real look to the future for Liverpool, building long-term with the new academy at Kirkby uniting the first-team with the academy – what better players’ to learn from than European, World and domestic champions?
Stewart’s fruition could come at a good time considering his age, with Mohamed Salah, Sadio Mane and Roberto Firmino all hitting 30 soon – his future looks exciting and hopefully he can maintain his positive progress in the coming seasons.