‘Dangerous’ ace Khephren Thuram is towering son of World Cup winner, named after pharaoh and ‘eats up video analysis’

Liverpool have two English midfielders competing in the Under-21 European Championship but it's one from France that they'll be keeping just as close an eye on.

Nice star Khephren Thuram, son of World Cup winning defender Lillian, is understood to be among the Reds' targets this summer.

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Thuram could find himself coming up against future Liverpool teammates Curtis Jones and Harvey Elliott at the U21 Euros.

The 22-year-old is already living up to his famous surname as the golden boy of the Thuram family.

His father Lillian is a World Cup winner with France and his older brother Marcus is a target for Manchester United and Arsenal.

And Khephren, named after the Egyptian pharaoh, admitted playing alongside the pair in the garden shaped him into the player he is.

He told the Telegraph: “My dad was a defender so my [older] brother would be an attacker. Then I had to be in the middle, in the midfield.

“So maybe that’s how me and my brother got our positions and it was really, really competitive.

“But they were nice moments, the three of us playing even if I finished a lot of times crying because I lost against my brother!

“Not that my dad ever let us win either. If he was going to win he was going to win.”

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Thuram understandably has been shaped by following in his father's footsteps having been born in Italy when his dad was at Parma.

He had a brief stint in Spain when Lillian starred at Barcelona and already speaks fluent English after being educated in Paris at an American school.

He added: “I was around Messi, Ronaldinho, Patrick Vieira, players like that. When I was younger I didn’t see them as players.

“I was just around the colleagues of my dad. Now when I see the photos, I am like, ‘Oh yeah, I was next to Messi!’”

Thuram came through the ranks at the same club as his father, having joined boyhood club Monaco as a 15-year-old.

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He instantly stands out at 6' 4 with his physical presence making him adept at one-v-one duels and as a box-to-box midfielder.

Likened to former Liverpool target Jude Bellingham, Thuram is also a keen dribbler, having attempted 77 dribbles in Ligue 1 last season.

His average of 1.3 a game smashes what Jordan Henderson (0.3), Fabinho (0.2) and Elliott (0.6) managed in the Premier League.

Thuram is also renowned for his pressing, but his former manager Didier Digard has signalled out his mindset as his greatest asset.

"Khephren's fantastic," Digard told RMC Sport earlier this year. "He is very hardworking, very attentive.

"On rest days he's at the training centre. He recovers quickly for back-to-back matches and completes high-intensity training.

“He listens and applies himself. He has room for improvement and he's in demand. He simply eats up video analysis, additional sessions.

“He also advises others, because he takes on a leadership role. He's also discovering himself as a person.”

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Of the clips he has been shown, Thuram is known to have studied similar tall but technically-proficient central midfielders like Paul Pogba, Yaya Toure and his former Nice manager, Vieira.

He also lined up alongside former Premier League stars Ross Barkley and Aaron Ramsey in midfield for Nice last season.

Ramsey has already backed him to reach the top, telling GFFN in February: "Khephren is another talented player here.

"I think he’s definitely got a big future ahead of him if he carries on the way he’s going at the minute. He’s very dangerous, very powerful, a very strong dribbler of the ball.

"Hopefully, he can keep progressing. He’s another player that can go all the way to the top I feel."

Thuram will now look to put himself in the shop window at the Under-21 Euros with Liverpool at the front of the queue to sign him.

Should he make the switch to Anfield then he will already have one friendly face in the form of Reds defender Ibrahima Konate.

As quoted by RMC Sport, Konate said: "I would be very happy for him [Thuram] to come to Liverpool and I would take him under my wing and I would do everything for him to progress and become the player he wants to become.

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"Khephren is like my little brother, he's someone I saw growing up. I was with his big brother in the training centre, but I saw him grow. I saw him perform and progress at a level… it was incredible.

"Even when he came to the France team for his first selection, I saw him at the training and I was really surprised by his size and his technical ease.

"When I was in Leipzig and I signed for Liverpool, many people said that it was too early, that it was not the right choice. In the end, I proved all these people wrong so you shouldn't listen to people.

"If Khephren has the opportunity to come to a club like Liverpool, I think he will be surprised the enthusiasm that will come behind him.

"It's up to him to work. He's still very young but he has an incredible margin for improvement so I'm confident."