Liverpool closing on Robbie Keane

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Robbie Keane moved closer to his dream transfer to Liverpool yesterday as the Merseysiders prepared to make an offer worth in the region of 20M pounds for the striker and Juande Ramos, the Tottenham manager, admitted that his club would be duty bound to consider it. Rafael Benitez, the Liverpool manager, has indentified Keane as a realistic target - he envisages him forming a partnership up front with Fernando Torres - and as the club's move for the Aston Villa midfielder Gareth Barry encounters difficulties they have made Keane their priority signing. Tottenham have maintained that neither Keane nor Dimitar Berbatov, their other leading striker who is the subject of a 20m bid from Manchester United as well as reported interet from Barcelona, is for sale. They have not encouraged the interest in either player and the chairman, Daniel Levy, will play hard ball with their suitors. United will have to increase their offer for Berbatov but Sir Alex Ferguson, their manager, is confident of getting the Bulgarian. "We have made Tottenham an offer on Berbatov and we have good expetations that this deal will go through," hi was quoted as saying by the Sun. "Bertatov has been impressive during a long time and would be a great addition to our attack." Liverpool reason that having sold Peter Crouch to Portsmouth for 11m, and with funds tight, their urgent need is for a replacement striker. They had hoped to sell the midfielder Xabi Alonso to Juventus to swell the transfer kitty but the Italian club signed Christian Poulsen for Sevilla instead and have declared that their summer spending is over. Although Liverpool still want Barry, who is also desperate to join them, they have refused to pay Villa's asking price of 18m. The Barry safa has rumbled on since the end of last season to damaging effect and Liverpool, who have opened a channel of communication with Tottenham, do not want a repeat over Keane. They intend to act decisively. Ramos may be more willing to enter into discussion with Sunderland, who last night made a quadruple bid for Steed Malbranque, Pascal Chimbonda, Younes Kaboul and Teem Tainio. Although it is unlikely Roy Keane will secure all four, Sunderland's manager has been tracking Malbranque for some time and is anxious to make his first summer signing. The sale of any one those players would go only a small way, though, to recouping the investment Levy has overseen in his squad during this transfer window and the previous two. When he completes the expected capture of David Bentley from Blackburn Rovers for about 15m he will have taken his spending during that period beyond 100m. He has also recouped sizeable funds already, most notably 18.6m from the transfer of Michael Carrick to Manchester United two years ago. Levy oversaw the outlay of 34.5m on four young players last summer, the most expensive of who was the striker Darren Bent at 16.5m, and he then gave Ramos 22.5m to buy four defenders in January. So far this summer he has committed to just under 30m, including 16.6m on the midfielder Luka Modric and an initial 4.7m on the winger Giovani dos Santos. Ramos, though, who remains in the market, stressed that the books had to balance. "Tottenham have a clear philosophy and have had for years," hae said. "We are on the stock exchange and have to balance the books. The idea is to buy young players with potential and talent and, if there are important offers for our older players, we study them. We bought Modric before Euro 2008 because we knew his price could rise. Giovani fits the policy, too. We will have to see what happens [with Keane and Berbatov] but they are important players." Ramos denied any interest in the Espanyol striker Luis Garcia - "We will not be signing him," he said - but he knows that replacements maybe required up front. Keane, a boyhood Liverpoolfan, and Berbatov are eager to move.