I SEE Trent Alexander-Arnold has woken up and smelt the coffee — which is why I see him waving goodbye to Liverpool in the summer and signing for Real Madrid.
If it were me and I fancied going out for a coffee or a cuppa after training, then I’d prefer to do so in Spain rather than Liverpool. Most would.
No disrespect as it’s a great club and a lively city but there is just something magical about Madrid. So you can see the pull for a world-class right-back.
It is probably Trent’s dream to play for Real Madrid and he’ll have seen pal Jude Bellingham do the same last year.
Bellingham could have gone from Borussia Dortmund to any Premier League club he fancied but the magnetism of the Bernabeu is irresistible.
My analogy about coffee seems trivial, of course, but there is so much involved in making a big move.
Liverpool is a special club but you have to remember he cost them nothing, has given them years of service as a former academy player and now is the time to try a new adventure.
Sometimes you can go stale and maybe it is time for him to go and play great football at another great club.
With his contract up in the summer there is serious money to be made, too.
It is similar but not quite the same for Mo Salah and Virgil van Dijk.
Alexander-Arnold is 26-years-old, the others in their early 30s. Salah, in particular, might be looking at one last big pay day by going to play in Saudi Arabia.
And for a young man like Alexander-Arnold this is the chance to reach for the stars, to play with a team of world-class pros, earn serious cash and win a serious number of trophies.
Liverpool is a big draw and Trent is a born-and-bred Scouser — but nothing competes with Madrid.
Reds icon Steve McManaman trod the same path many years back and I don’t think he sits around regretting it.
The opportunity to become Real Madrid’s next right-back for five or six years is a dream and Trent can absolutely be that player for them.
Liverpool have slotted him in to midfield as well as full-back but, while I see a world-class defender in him, he is not a world-class midfielder.
There should be no debate about where he plays. At the Euros, England tried to switch him into the middle and some of the games passed him by.
Midfielders are a different breed, you’ve got to have fantastic awareness to play there.
As a right-back you see the whole picture. It’s different. He’s a great passer from there.
He should stick to his strengths and be the best right- back in Europe at Real.
And it’s not as if Liverpool will be left high and dry when he goes as they have an energetic, young replacement waiting in the wings in Conor Bradley, who will fill that void.
Another homegrown product, I particularly like Bradley’s pace — and so along comes the next great Liverpool player.
We also have to admit that the era of the great one-club man is pretty much dead, too.
Liverpool have had more than their fair share of loyal players with the likes of Jamie Carragher and Steven Gerrard.
Go back further and there were even more but the way the game is now — as well as the money that is on offer, the ease of travel and communication and such like — makes it easier to go and play abroad.
Cross border transfers and the Bosman Ruling has opened up a whole new world to players and you really cannot begrudge any of them wanting to experience it.
Keep it simple
WHY do all keepers think they are Pele these days?
Sorry . . . I mean why do all managers think their goalkeepers are Pele?
And I say this after I watched Spurs squeeze through their Carabao Cup quarter-final with Manchester United on Thursday.
My old team played well but what is this obsession with playing the ball out from the back every time? It has gone crazy.
Every coach wants to be Pep Guardiola — even if they do not have the talent of his Manchester City team.
When you watch it, the ball goes from the right-back to the keeper, out to the left-back, back again, then they give the ball away.
And teams put themselves under needless pressure when sometimes it suits to just boot it upfield.
No disrespect to Spurs keeper Fraser Forster, he’s a good player but he isn’t a footballer — he’s a goalkeeper.
You have got a big centre- forward there in Dominic Solanke, who is great in the air, and I’d want the ball going up to him to win it.
As a manager the last thing I wanted was my centre-backs bringing the ball out.
They all had their skills and dribbling just wasn’t one of them.
Unfortunately it has gone crazy and it’s so stupid. Our teams just can’t do it.
They are not good enough to do it as they give the ball away.
RIP, Oscar Fairs
I was so sad to read of the young West Ham goalkeeper who sadly died in the past week or so.
We all worry about trivial things and then football and a family loses their boy due to cancer when he had the world at his feet.
I don’t know Oscar Fairs or his family but I really would like to send them my condolences and love at what must be an awful time.
A Christmas message
Christmas is now just around the corner and at my age it’s hard to know what to ask Santa for.
So all I can tell you is that I have got lots of socks — and probably more than the England kit man!
Merry Christmas to you all and a Happy New Year.
