From Sunderland to Serie A, Blackburn to the Bundesliga, Tottenham to Turkey, the glut of enquiries for Liverpool’s evergreen centre-half are persistent enough for a small call centre to be housed in one of the offices at Anfield.
Manager Rafa Benitez remains adamant the defender is too valuable to let go, yet it is testament to Hyypia’s enduring appeal that Liverpool could still almost double the £2.5million fee they paid to Dutch side Willem II for the player a decade ago.
Hyypia is in line to make his 700th career appearance on Saturday at Stoke – just another of the clubs who would pay a king’s ransom to recruit the veteran – and his importance to the cause in recent weeks has merely highlighted why he still retains such a fanatical following.
It was former Liverpool chief executive and Vice-Chairman Peter Robinson who first received a tip-off about Hyypia in 1998, with then manager Gerard Houllier and assistant Phil Thompson quick to act on the information.
Thompson, a central-defender who won seven league titles and two European Cups among other honours in 477 first-team appearances for the club, is better placed than most to pass judgment on Hyypia’s longevity.
“It doesn’t surprise me that so many teams would want Sami,” said Thompson. “He has been, and still is, brilliant for Liverpool.
“When you consider how much he cost then pound-for-pound he is up there with the £440,000 the club paid for Kenny Dalglish.
“I remember going to watch him playing for Finland against Oliver Bierhoff and Germany in Nuremberg. Bierhoff’s strength was in the air and Sami never let him win a header.
“We signed Stephane Henchoz at the same time as Sami and he was the better known of the two and people probably expected more from him.
“But after a couple of days on the training pitch with Sami, I was thinking we’ve signed a central midfielder here because he was that authoritative and comfortable on the ball.
“It always makes me laugh when people started saying a few years ago his pace had gone. Sami Hyypia never had any pace to lose! What he has got is an incredible ability to read the game and that has been his biggest asset. More often than not he is in position.
“I’d be lying if I said that when we signed him I thought he’d still be going strong 10 years later. That’s incredibly difficult to do, especially for a foreign player in the Premier League.
“He’s a legend and, for me, Sami is in Alan Hansen’s ilk.”
If Hyypia’s immediate future remains at Anfield, then Liverpool still have two major decisions to make over his prospects in the coming weeks.
The first is whether to hand him another one-year extension to his present deal which expires in the summer.
Given the uncertainty remaining over Daniel Agger’s long-term prospects, Benitez must wonder where he would find someone as reliable and also as willing to adopt Liverpool’s team-first ethos as Hyypia.
Secondly, and more pressing, Benitez must decide whether to find room in his Champions League squad for 35-year-old Hyypia, having controversially omitted him at the start of the season.
Hyypia is likely to push for clarification over where he now stands, with Liverpool having to resubmit their squad to UEFA for the knockout stages by midnight on February 1.
The perennially-injured Philipp Degen is taking up a place in the squad, although the emergence of Argentine left-back Emiliano Insua, who is also not presently on the list, complicates what is a sensitive issue.
Manager Rafa Benitez remains adamant the defender is too valuable to let go, yet it is testament to Hyypia’s enduring appeal that Liverpool could still almost double the £2.5million fee they paid to Dutch side Willem II for the player a decade ago.
Hyypia is in line to make his 700th career appearance on Saturday at Stoke – just another of the clubs who would pay a king’s ransom to recruit the veteran – and his importance to the cause in recent weeks has merely highlighted why he still retains such a fanatical following.
It was former Liverpool chief executive and Vice-Chairman Peter Robinson who first received a tip-off about Hyypia in 1998, with then manager Gerard Houllier and assistant Phil Thompson quick to act on the information.
Thompson, a central-defender who won seven league titles and two European Cups among other honours in 477 first-team appearances for the club, is better placed than most to pass judgment on Hyypia’s longevity.
“It doesn’t surprise me that so many teams would want Sami,” said Thompson. “He has been, and still is, brilliant for Liverpool.
“When you consider how much he cost then pound-for-pound he is up there with the £440,000 the club paid for Kenny Dalglish.
“I remember going to watch him playing for Finland against Oliver Bierhoff and Germany in Nuremberg. Bierhoff’s strength was in the air and Sami never let him win a header.
“We signed Stephane Henchoz at the same time as Sami and he was the better known of the two and people probably expected more from him.
“But after a couple of days on the training pitch with Sami, I was thinking we’ve signed a central midfielder here because he was that authoritative and comfortable on the ball.
“It always makes me laugh when people started saying a few years ago his pace had gone. Sami Hyypia never had any pace to lose! What he has got is an incredible ability to read the game and that has been his biggest asset. More often than not he is in position.
“I’d be lying if I said that when we signed him I thought he’d still be going strong 10 years later. That’s incredibly difficult to do, especially for a foreign player in the Premier League.
“He’s a legend and, for me, Sami is in Alan Hansen’s ilk.”
If Hyypia’s immediate future remains at Anfield, then Liverpool still have two major decisions to make over his prospects in the coming weeks.
The first is whether to hand him another one-year extension to his present deal which expires in the summer.
Given the uncertainty remaining over Daniel Agger’s long-term prospects, Benitez must wonder where he would find someone as reliable and also as willing to adopt Liverpool’s team-first ethos as Hyypia.
Secondly, and more pressing, Benitez must decide whether to find room in his Champions League squad for 35-year-old Hyypia, having controversially omitted him at the start of the season.
Hyypia is likely to push for clarification over where he now stands, with Liverpool having to resubmit their squad to UEFA for the knockout stages by midnight on February 1.
The perennially-injured Philipp Degen is taking up a place in the squad, although the emergence of Argentine left-back Emiliano Insua, who is also not presently on the list, complicates what is a sensitive issue.
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