Trent Alexander-Arnold has made the decision to leave the Premier League champions, with Jamie Carragher explaining the hurt for fans.
Our former defender wrote for The Telegraph: ‘Once you are a mainstay at a club of Liverpool’s stature you are already at the summit of the game. As a Scouser, for me it does not get any bigger or better…
‘By leaving Liverpool, Alexander-Arnold is making it harder for his own club to win its 21st league title and seventh European Cup. That is bound to stir emotions…
‘Swapping Liverpool red for Real Madrid white means he has chosen to become a rival. It means the next time he is at Anfield he will receive the same treatment as Luis Suarez when he returned to Merseyside in a Barcelona shirt.
‘With Monday’s statement, the unconditional support Alexander-Arnold enjoyed from the Kop when he was fully committed to Liverpool has gone.
‘It has to be this way at the biggest clubs.’
Many of a non-Anfield persuasion are seemingly blaming a free transfer on this outpouring of negative emotions but that is not the main reason.
Look at Raheem Sterling and Fernando Torres, the club received transfer fees for both but it didn’t help their exits either.
What hurts most about Trent is that he said he was one of us, he wanted to be our captain, he wanted to spend his whole career here and we believed him.
He knows this decision will hurt us all, he says he understands but then why did he do it?
Liverpool fans aren’t angry with a lack of money for Alexander-Arnold
It would have been great to get £150 million to invest into the squad but the reaction would still be one of anger for many.
When you’re a young supporter growing up in the city, you look up to Steven Gerrard, Jamie Carragher and Trent Alexander-Arnold.
They’re living your dreams and you would swap everything to be them and feel associated to them because they feel exactly how you do.
Now we’re finding out that the Scouser in our team isn’t one of us, he doesn’t share our values, he wouldn’t give everything to play for the club – otherwise he wouldn’t be leaving.
More fool the fans for believing that a young lad from West Derby shared our dreams and aspirations.
These dreams can now be pinned on Curtis Jones who now will be the Scouser in our team, to Harvey Elliott and Conor Bradley who grew up supporting the club and to the likes of Jayden Danns should he kick on and earn a place in the first team.
However, with each transfer decision like this that happens, it just dents your child-like adoration of the lads who wear the red shirt every week.
If even those who are supposed to be one of us can be lured away, who will be the next local lad that kids can hope to emulate?
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Spot on Carra
Wish he’d just come out and said he was going instead of stringing it along and giving hope he’d sign. The will he/won’t he saga with his contract made it far worse than it needed to be. He could have said at Christmas “I’m doing this but giving my all until then to make sure I go leaving Liverpool at their best” would have been easier to take than trying to hide his leaving behind the title celebrations. Him leaving hurts, not getting a fee to reinvest hurts, but hopefully the board will learn lessons about getting contracts sorted early
150m…are you deluded!!!! Rivals to Madrid…do me a flavour. Mad you lot. People move all the time,grow up and get on with it ffs