Curtis Jones ends 16-year Liverpool association in confirmed €30m move to Inter Milan

Curtis Jones has left Liverpool after completing a €30m move to Inter Milan, ending a 16-year association with his hometown club that began when he joined the Anfield academy as a nine-year-old.

The deal includes up to €5m in achievable add-ons, and Liverpool have retained a 10 percent sell-on clause. The move brings to a close Jones’s 228-appearance career at Anfield — 49 of which came last season — and averts the risk of losing him for nothing, with the midfielder entering the final year of his contract.

New Liverpool head coach Andoni Iraola confirmed he had wanted to keep the England international but accepted the outcome after Jones made clear he wished to move on. “Yes [I wanted to keep him], Curtis is a good player, but I understood this,” Iraola said. “He is coming for some years in the same situation, so I knew from that moment it could happen.”

The Spanish coach added that his conversations with Jones left him in little doubt about the direction things were heading. “I talked to him. I value him a lot as a player, he loves this club, it was very clear since the very beginning for me. But I understood that probably the outcome was going to be what it has been in the end.”

Liverpool had rejected an initial €25m bid from Inter in June before agreeing to the improved offer. Despite the departure, the club are not expected to sign a direct replacement in midfield, with Iraola pointing to 19-year-old Trey Nyoni’s impressive pre-season as a reason for confidence in the position.

“I’m very happy with Trey,” Iraola said. “He has been very good in pre-season, not only in the games — even when he trains with us he’s facing top-level players and he’s at the level. He will be very valuable this season for us.”

Instead, Liverpool’s transfer focus remains firmly on the wide positions. The club have seen two bids — of £50m and £60m — for Brighton’s Yankuba Minteh rejected, and they are also understood to be interested in Paris Saint-Germain winger Bradley Barcola. Iraola was candid about the urgency in that area: “There are certain situations which for me are clear, especially now in the wing because we don’t have enough players to play in those positions.”