Arsene Wenger believes Real Madrid may have contacted Trent Alexander-Arnold as far back as two years ago, as the Liverpool right-back prepares to make the move to the Spanish capital.
Alexander-Arnold announced his impending departure earlier this week, telling supporters that his decision to leave was fuelled by a desire to seek a new challenge. The right-back is leaving the club on a free transfer and will pocket an eight-figure signing on fee as well as weekly wages in excess of $280,000 per week.
Alexander-Arnold is the latest superstar to choose to join Real Madrid on a free transfer, after Antonio Rudiger, David Alaba, and Kylian Mbappe made similar moves over the last few years.
Wenger thinks this points towards a wider trend in the game, whereby players — rather than selling clubs — reap the benefits from moving to a new team.
“I believe it shows a new trend in the game that there is no transfer [fee], for the big big players; they go all at the end of their contract because the wages are so high,” Wenger said on beIN SPORTS. “If you want to buy [fellow pundit] Marcel [Desailly] now, you have to pay him so much money that you can’t afford the transfer fee anymore so what do they do?
(Image: 2025 Marc Atkins)
“They say two years before the end of a contract: ‘We want to buy you, we’ll give you these wages, and we will try to make an offer. If it doesn’t work, we will come back next year and if it doesn’t work we’ll take you for free.’ It’s what they did with [Kylian] Mbappe. Real Madrid approached Alexander-Arnold a long, long time ago.”
Wenger was asked whether he was surprised by the timing of Alexander-Arnold’s departure announcement considering Liverpool still has three Premier League games to play before the end of the season.
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“Not really,” Wenger responded. “Because the season is over for him and overall I believe the timing is right because Liverpool are the champions they don’t go for any other trophy so they don’t go for anything. It gives Liverpool time to get another defender. He will be difficult to replace because he was a creative full back.”
Liverpool has been linked with Bayer Leverkusen’s Jeremie Frimpong as a possible replacement for Alexander-Arnold, while Reds back-up right-back Conor Bradley has also made strides this season.
Bradley, though, has struggled with injuries over the course of the campaign and that could make the Reds reluctant to put their trust in him to shoulder the burden of replacing Alexander-Arnold on a full-time basis.
