Mamadou Sakho is out of favour at Liverpool

The former Crystal Palace boss took the madcap Frenchman on loan last season to great effect.

Sakho helped the Eagles avoid relegation but is unwanted at Anfield after falling out with boss Jurgen Klopp.

Liverpool have been trailing Southampton’s Virgil van Dijk all summer but seem destined to miss out with the window set to close in a week’s time.

And Allardyce thinks the man to sure up Liverpool’s leaky defence is already at the club.

He told talkSPORT: “It’s easy for him (Sakho) to give it to players like (Philippe) Coutinho and people like that and let them get on with it.

“For me, there is a big misconception, even in the Premier League, of the amount of ability that a centre-half has to have on the ball.

“He has to have a lot of ability but at the end of the day has job is defending and keeping clean sheets.

“Your first job is defending, get the ball and keep it simple.

“It’s very effective and Mama is very effective because he can get it down and play simple, play it into midfield.”