“Once you move…” – Ex-Liverpool star warns Trent Alexander-Arnold about Real Madrid transfer

Liverpool right-back Trent Alexander-Arnold has been given an interesting warning by former Reds star Michael Owen about sealing a transfer to Real Madrid.

Owen notably left Liverpool for Real Madrid in the summer of 2004, but he admits it wasn’t an easy move for him to make and it changed his career in many ways.

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It seems the former England international isn’t overly positive about how different it felt when he left his boyhood club Liverpool for the Bernabeu, where he didn’t feel valued in quite the same way.

Alexander-Arnold could do well to take Owen’s words on board here as he heads towards the end of his contract and continues to be linked strongly as a top target for Real Madrid by ABC and others.

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Speaking to The Athletic, Owen discussed his own move from Merseyside to Madrid, saying: “Once you’ve moved once and you’re not in the place everyone assumes you are never going to move on from, you almost become a tradable asset.

“I never grew up wanting to play for Real Madrid but it’s an honour I did. I grew up wanting to play for Liverpool.

“Once you move, you lose that absolute attachment to your club and you become a trading proposition. You lose the glue you once had, going from contract to contract, because you aren’t playing for the team you support. You’re just a player trying to do well for a specific club.

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“It means more than that when you’ve come through the ranks.”

Alexander-Arnold could perhaps look at LFC legend Steven Gerrard as someone who did things differently, with the former club captain never playing for another major European club, even though he will surely have had a few opportunities to do so.

Instead, Gerrard played for Liverpool until his mid-30s before a brief spell in the MLS before he retired.

Alexander-Arnold might justifiably feel, however, that he’d trade being a Liverpool legend like Gerrard and instead look at how relatively little the former England midfielder won, having never got his hands on a league title.