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Liverpool head coach Arne Slot insists Trent Alexander-Arnold is fully committed to the club in the wake of Real Madrid’s approach this week.
However, when the Reds boss was offered the chance to state publicly the England international would not be sold in January, the Dutchman merely said he would be playing against Manchester United on Sunday.
Slot, as the club’s first head coach rather than manager, has had responsibility for contract negotiations and transfers taken out of his hands and, as a result, has always refused to speak about them and defer to sporting director Richard Hughes.
Privately, the club insist the 26-year-old, who is out of contract in the summer, is not for sale and when the Champions League holders made an enquiry a few days ago, it was immediately rebuffed with the message they had no intention of discussing it further.
Slot remained guarded in his press conference, but confirmed he has spoken with Alexander-Arnold following the Real approach and does not believe it will have a destabilising effect.
“I completely understand the question and why you ask it, but you already know the answer: these conversations I have never shared, not about Trent, not about any others, about what I talk to them about,” he said.
“It was a conversation as many others we had, me and Trent, so let’s leave it at that.
“I can tell you he is playing on Sunday and hopefully he brings the same performances as he brought in for the last half-year, because everybody saw how great a first half of the season he had, how much he is here, how much he wants to win here.
“I see him on the training ground every day working his ass off. He is fully committed to us and he will play on Sunday.
“If it would destabilise players at Liverpool if other people talk about them, then we would really have a problem because if you play at one of the biggest clubs in the world everybody is always – for 12 months long – talking about you, sometimes in relation to other clubs.
“That happens so many times for our players, so if that destabilises them then we really would have had a problem, not only now but in the last six months because there were some talks about our players in the last six months and I don’t think it destabilised them at all.”
Slot was more forthcoming on an injury to Joe Gomez, whose eight-match run in the side deputising for the injured Ibrahima Konate has come to an end due to a hamstring problem sustained in the weekend win at West Ham.
“Joe is, of course, not in a good place when it comes to his injury. He is out for a few weeks, that’s for sure,” said Slot.
There was better news on Konate and Conor Bradley, who are back from knee and hamstring injuries respectively.
“Conor and Ibou will train with us today for the first time so I’m interested to see where they exactly are,” said the head coach.
“They have worked hard to come back to the team but the next step is always ‘how do you handle team sessions?’.”
