Jarell Quansah has admitted his decision to leave Liverpool for Bayer Leverkusen this summer was driven by a desire for regular first-team football, after finding himself on the periphery under head coach Arne Slot.
The 22-year-old defender, who rose through the Liverpool academy system, made 58 senior appearances for the Reds but struggled for consistent starts last season.
He began Slot’s first competitive match in charge the Premier League opener against Ipswich Town but was substituted at half-time for what the Dutch coach described as “tactical reasons.”
That moment proved decisive. Quansah did not start another league match until December and finished the campaign with just four Premier League starts to his name. His final months at Anfield were spent largely behind Ibrahima Konaté in the pecking order, and by July, he had agreed a £35 million move to Bayer Leverkusen.
“I have been learning from some of the best players around me at the time at Liverpool,” Quansah reflected. “Being able to do that has been so good for my career. It has always been a big part of it. At this part of my career, 22 turning 23 [in January], I need hundreds of games to be where I want to be.
“I think overall that’s why the decision was made and why I thought going abroad was best for me.”
Quansah’s rise through Liverpool’s youth ranks had been one of the more encouraging academy stories of recent years. Composed in possession and confident stepping into midfield, he looked set to push for a starting role after impressing during the 2023–24 campaign.
But Slot’s arrival altered the landscape. The new manager preferred the established pairing of Virgil van Dijk and Konaté, with Jarell Quansah struggling to regain his place following that early setback at Portman Road. He completed the full 90 minutes in only three of Liverpool’s 38 league fixtures, two of which came after the title had already been secured.
With a World Cup looming next summer in the USA, Canada and Mexico, remaining on the fringes of Liverpool’s first team risked stalling both his club career and his England ambitions.
Quansah was part of England’s victorious Under-21 European Championship squad earlier this summer and has been named in five senior squads to date, selected by three different managers Gareth Southgate, interim boss Lee Carsley and now Thomas Tuchel. He has yet to make his senior debut, but remains hopeful.
“It is not a strange feeling, I’m really delighted to be here,” he said of his latest call-up. “[It is] always a huge honour to get called up and I’m thankful for the manager for that as well. It is always about learning from the senior players who have more caps than I do.
“Hopefully it is something I will achieve, a cap for England.”
England host Wales at Wembley on Thursday before travelling to Latvia for a World Cup qualifier next Tuesday, with Quansah again part of Tuchel’s squad after featuring on the bench against Serbia last month.
The early signs at Leverkusen are encouraging. Quansah has slotted into a three-man defence under manager Kasper Hjulmand and started in their 2–0 win over Union Berlin at the weekend — a result that extended their unbeaten league run to five games and lifted them to fifth in the Bundesliga table.
He has also featured in both of Leverkusen’s Champions League group-stage matches so far, draws against FC Copenhagen and PSV Eindhoven, with a marquee clash against Paris Saint-Germain looming on the horizon.
Quansah believes the move abroad has already started to pay off, providing the platform for the “hundreds of games” he feels he needs to continue his development.
For Quansah, leaving the club where he came through the ranks was not a decision taken lightly. But after a season in which opportunities were scarce, the defender felt the timing was right to embrace a new challenge.
Quansah remains grateful for his Liverpool education but clear that regular minutes were non-negotiable at this stage of his career.
“Being at Liverpool helped me grow as a player and a person,” he said. “But I knew this was the right moment to find a place where I can play consistently.”
For Liverpool, his departure may be viewed as a loss of homegrown talent, but for Quansah, it represents a decisive step forward. His willingness to leave behind the familiarity of Anfield for the challenges of the Bundesliga speaks to a player with clarity about his goals and the determination to reach them.
If his trajectory continues on its current course, this summer’s move could come to be seen as the defining moment that transformed a promising academy graduate into a fully-fledged international defender.
