Liverpool fans go wild for huge melwood charity auction

* LIVERPOOL HAVE AUCTIONED OFF 454 ITEMS FROM THE OLD MELWOOD TRAINING GROUND * FANS DESPERATE TO GET THEIR HANDS ON A MEMENTO HAVE GONE WAY OVER ESTIMATES * A BASIC 'IT OFFICE'

SIGN VALUED AT BETWEEN £80 AND £120 WAS BOUGHT FOR £650  * 'WELCOME TO MELWOOD' SIGN WAS SOLD FOR £1,100, £300 MORE THAN ITS ESTIMATE  * A TOTAL OF £373,640 WAS RAISED, SOME OF

WHICH WILL GO TO THE LFC FOUNDATION  * THE ICONIC CHAMPIONS WALL WAS SOLD FOR £30,000 - DOUBLE ITS ORIGINAL ESTIMATE   By JOE STRANGE FOR MAILONLINE Published: 11:27 EDT, 2 March 2021 |

Updated: 04:13 EDT, 3 March 2021 Liverpool fans desperate to own a piece of the club's history splashed out over £373,000 on items ranging from office signs and sofas, to a photo of

former boss Roy Hodgson in a huge Melwood memorabilia auction on Tuesday. The auction, which smashed its estimated total value of £200,000, featured a wide variety of items from the

club's recently-closed training ground, including locker doors, a dartboard and Jurgen Klopp's heavy metal headphones. The iconic champions wall, which used to be placed in the

main reception at Melwood, went for the highest price, sold for a whopping £30,000 - despite a pre-bid estimate of between £7,500 and £15,000.   But it wasn't just the eye-catching

items which had people bidding in their droves, with even the most ordinary lots being snapped-up by devoted supporters, as the sale of 454 items in total raised £373,640, some of which will

go to the LFC Foundation.  The 'Melwood Training Facility' sign went for the second-highest price - at £8,500 - while the football boots storage rack unit for the first-team was

sold for an astonishing £3,600.   Even ordinary items went for three figure sums - a sign reading 'Facilities / IT Office', which was estimated at between £80 and £120, was bought

for a whopping £650, while another for the Human Resources department fetched £380 despite being valued at between £150 and £250. One two-seater sofa from outside Klopp's office was

sold for an incredible £1,700 after plenty of interest, while another from inside went for £1,600 and a set of scales brought in another £340. But perhaps the biggest indicator of the huge

demand for items came when a photo of Roy Hodgson, the club's former boss who was sacked after just six months following a disastrous spell in charge, went for £420.  A set of three

green chairs were sold for £700, while two red chairs were bought for a far more reasonable £260. And in a sign of the times, a hand sanitiser dispenser embossed with the Liverpool crest,

was snapped up for £320 on Tuesday afternoon. The reigning Premier League champions left Melwood, their training base since the 1950s, in November to move to a new state-of-the-art

£50million facility at Kirkby. And now all manner of items have been auctioned off by sports memorabilia specialist Graham Budd.   Speaking about the auction last month, auctioneer Budd told

Sportsmail: 'If you're a Liverpool fan, this is the one for you. 'They have now vacated Melwood and everything that wasn't moved and wasn't salvageable is all in

this auction. 'Some profits from the sale will be going to the Liverpool Foundation and their other charitable efforts, so it's for a good cause as well. 'I'd say the

signature lot is the iconic Champions Wall, which has been added to over the years as they have won trophies. It's such a recognisable piece of Liverpool imagery.  'The Welcome to

Melwood sign, which greeted everyone who swung in through the gates, as well. But there is something here for everybody, a few lots will go for £100. We hope it's quite inclusive to a

lot of Liverpool fans. 'We had an Anfield stadium auction in 2018 when the new stand was built with lots of memorabilia from the old stand. That was an eye-opener because the lots went

to every part of the globe - the Far East, America, Australia. 'We're expecting the same again this time.'