UEFA Champions League Fenerbahce SK v Liverpool FC - Source: Getty
UEFA Champions League Fenerbahce SK v Liverpool FC - Source: Getty
Rio Ngumoha has said leaving Chelsea for Liverpool was “a no-brainer”, with the 18-year-old winger pointing to the route into the first team he was shown before the move.
Ngumoha left Stamford Bridge in the summer of 2024, weeks after turning 16 and after eight years in Chelsea’s academy. With no fee agreed, the move went to a tribunal, which set an initial £2.8m payment rising to a potential £6.8m with add-ons, plus a 20 per cent sell-on clause, as reported by The Athletic.
Speaking about the move to The Telegraph, he said (via LFC Transfer Room on X):
“I feel like I needed a new challenge. I feel like if I stayed at Chelsea... I’m not saying that I wouldn’t have got to the first team as quick, because I believe in my ability, but I feel like Liverpool just gave me a new pathway.”
He then added:
“The plan that they set for me was straightforward really. For me, it was a no-brainer going to Liverpool, and they just said if I prove myself, because they know how much ability I had, then they know that I would definitely be a first-team player and definitely a star for them in the making.”
The proof has come quickly. Ngumoha started the FA Cup third-round tie against Accrington Stanley at Anfield in January 2025, and in August he came off the bench at Newcastle to score a 100th-minute winner, becoming the club’s youngest-ever goalscorer at 16 years and 361 days.
Ngumoha’s current deal runs to 2028, and after the 2-1 win at Brentford in October he told reporters the talks were “going well” and that he was letting his football do the talking.
No comment was available from either club at the time of writing.
Rio Ngumoha’s numbers for Liverpool since breaking into the first team
His first full season in the Liverpool senior squad brought 19 Premier League appearances, five of them starts, 560 minutes, two goals and one assist. The goals were the stoppage-time winner at Newcastle in August 2025 and a finish in the 2-0 home win over Fulham in April 2026.
This season the balance has changed: six Premier League appearances, only one of them a start, and no goal yet, but three Champions League outings and two assists.
Iraola has used him on both flanks, as part of a careful plan to build him up at 18. Ngumoha is not yet a guaranteed starter, but the pathway he was promised has held up.