Alexander Isak: Are Newcastle’s owners PIF helping Liverpool buy Magpies striker?

However, football finance expert Kieran Maguire says Liverpool can afford to buy Isak regardless of whether Nunez stays or leaves.

“Although they’ve been very active in the transfer window, if they really wanted to, they could have spent another £200-250m, and still would have been within the PSR [profit and sustainability rules] limits,” he told BBC Sport.

Liverpool have signed Florian Wirtz, Hugo Ekitike, Milos Kerkez, Jeremie Frimpong, Giorgi Mamardashvili and Armin Pecsi for a combined total of about £265m without add-ons.

However, the departures of Luis Diaz, Jarell Quansah, Caoimhin Kelleher and Trent Alexander-Arnold have recouped an initial £115m.

Maguire added: “I think people are joining the dots and perhaps making two plus two equals five in terms of, is this a ‘you scratching my back? I’ll scratch yours’ type of situation. But in my view, there’s insufficient evidence to back that up.

“I suspect that Liverpool are likely to be the biggest beneficiary of this, rather than a PIF club. Newcastle don’t want to sell Isak.

“As far as Al Hilal are concerned, there are plenty of strikers that they could have bought. It just so happens that Nunez is effectively available, and therefore they decided to pursue that as an option.”