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Doing a vox pop on a Liverpool street ahead of a Merseyside derby in 2015, the BBC reporter approached a random gentleman doing his shopping and asked him if he remembered the 1967 instalment at Goodison Park.

'Remember it? I played in it,' came Tommy Lawrence’s answer.

The Flying Pig was a key member of Liverpool’s title-winning side of 1963-64 and 1965-66, as well as keeping goal in the club’s first FA Cup triumph in 1965.

A beloved figure at Anfield, Tommy sadly passed away earlier this year.

Had he still been around this week and been stopped while out buying a loaf of bread, I wonder what he would have made of Liverpool, or any club for that matter, paying almost £70million for a goalkeeper.

Remember when keepers were the cheap cuts of meat?

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Lawrence’s eventual successor, Ray Clemence, set Liverpool back £18,000.

Only 11 years ago, the £9m given to Hearts by Sunderland for Craig Gordon was a British record.

The £67m fee about to be paid for Alisson is, quite frankly, ridiculous.

That’s £67m for the goalkeeper past whom you knocked seven in two matches just three months ago.

Have a look back at those goals Liverpool scored against Roma in their Champions League semi-final tie.

Alisson, who as recently as the 2016-17 season was understudy to former Arsenal No2 Wojciech Szczesny at the Italian side, is not obviously at fault for any of those goals. But nor does he get remotely close to stopping them.

(Image: AFP)

He is first choice for Brazil, ahead of Manchester City’s widely-praised Ederson, and is clearly an outstanding keeper. His statistics, we are told, are remarkable, and his highlights collection is impressive, but £67m?

Jurgen Klopp is doing what Jurgen Klopp once suggested he would baulk at. He is paying preposterously inflated transfer fees to solve obvious problems.

Obvious problem at the heart of the defence? £75m for Virgil van Dijk.

Obvious problem between the sticks? £67m for Alisson.

That the latter problem has only just dawned on Klopp is another matter, but there is nothing wrong with the policy. But it is a policy that was not automatically associated with the German’s early Liverpool times.

(Image: Getty)

His 2016 quote on wanting to do things ‘differently’ hardly need repeating, but here goes:

“Other clubs can spend big money on top players. I want to do it differently. I would even do it differently if I could spend that money.”

Maybe Klopp did not have ‘that money’ at that time, hence it was a convenient soundbite. And if it turns out he has overpaid for Alisson, then he could point out he vastly underpaid for Mo Salah.

He also turned Philippe Coutinho into a player who brought more than £100m into Liverpool coffers. Van Dijk and Alisson for just a little more than Coutinho’s sale price? Not bad business, probably.

And Naby Keita for £60m? Fabinho for £44m? Pretty much the going rates nowadays, it seems.

But the romanticism of Klopp’s approach has been stripped away. A bludgeoning bank card is as much his weapon as it is anyone else’s in these financially surreal footballing times.

That cavalier run to the Champions League final more than atoned for a Premier League points tally which was one less than his Reds won in the previous season.

But after his record-breaking antics in the transfer market this year, the pressure for domestic improvement is on Klopp.

Alisson might not help Liverpool to a couple of league titles in the way the Flying Pig did but, now, the first trophy of Klopp’s Anfield reign cannot come soon enough.