Despite losing Jurgen Klopp on Sunday, there are plenty of reasons for Liverpool fans to be excited about the future.
With Arne Slot coming in, there’s set to be a completely fresh start at Anfield in 2024/25.
This clean slate will extend to much of the first-team squad. Players that may not have been favoured under Klopp could get a second chance with Slot.
Aside from those few who have question marks over them, the new manager and his coaching team have a tremendously talented group to work with.
In amongst that, according to pundit Paul Merson, Slot will have access to a player who’s ‘a million miles’ ahead of anyone else in the country right now.
Paul Merson hails Trent Alexander-Arnold’s passing
Slot must be looking at the Liverpool squad and licking his lips. Although there are one or two areas that need upgrading, it is a group that has a lot going for it.
With a bit of tweaking here and there, this could be a really special batch of players. Slot will back himself to make the necessary adjustments.
One player who is perhaps in most need of those tweaks is Trent Alexander-Arnold. Although Trent is clearly one of Liverpool’s best players, he could also do with having his position cleared up. One of Slot’s biggest jobs will be working out how to use the 25-year-old properly.
Speaking to Sky Sports following Alexander-Arnold’s inclusion in the provisional England Euro 2024 squad, Merson has suggested that that means putting the academy graduate permanently in midfield.
“I’m not sure about Trent Alexander-Arnold at right-back, I’m not,” says the pundit. “I think he’s a talented player, his range of passing is second to none. I think he’s the best passer in the country but I don’t think he’s a defender at international level.
“It’s an hard one, he’s played against some lesser country teams. He’s not played against the crème de la crème in midfield. He’s played against team where he’s going to have time on the ball, it’s hard to judge. You’re going to play against Toni Kroos and people like that, seasoned pro’s, [Luka] Modric. You go and get them and they flick it around the corner.
“For me if he comes into the team get him on the ball, he’s the best passer in the country in my opinion by a million miles. His range of passing is second to none. And this is how good we are, he probably won’t play.”
Where Trent Alexander-Arnold will play under Arne Slot
This season has been the first full one where Alexander-Arnold has performed his hybrid midfield, right-back role.
In truth, at times it has worked, at others we’d have loved to see Trent back to being an out-and-out full-back.
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If he isn’t going to play there, then we’d suggest that he should indeed be moved to midfield. Former Liverpool player Danny Murphy thinks that’s what Slot will eventually do with the No.66, and we do too.
From a permanent central position, you take away a lot of the worries – unfounded or not – over Trent’s defending while getting him in an area he can always be on the ball.
If Gareth Southgate uses the Liverpool man centrally at the Euros, maybe it will further encourage Slot to do the same. As Merson says, there’s no one who can pass it quite like Alexander-Arnold. That’s a weapon the new boss needs to use.