Liverpool fans fear Trent Alexander-Arnold has already made his mind up to leave the club in the summer amid reports that contract talks have stalled.
The Reds have made a record breaking start to life under new manager Arne Slot and currently sit top of both fledgling Premier League and Champions League tables.
While Liverpool undoubtedly look set for a thrilling campaign that may well end with the major silverware that evaded Jurgen Klopp in his last season at the club, but there is a measure of concern among the Anfield faithful over the long-term future.
Three senior players, who have played key roles in Liverpool’s biggest successes of recent years, Mohamed Salah, Virgil van Dijk and Trent Alexander-Arnold, are all out of contract next summer.
That trio have all remained largely coy on what their next moves could be, but with January just around the corner Liverpool will powerless to prevent them from entering into negotiations with potential suitors over lucrative free transfers.
According to The Sun, Alexnader-Arnold has put negotiations on ice while Liverpool are said to be reluctant to offer him a salary that would put him on par with Salah and Van Dijk.
Real Madrid, who have made a habit of signing some of the world’s best players on free transfers, are understood to be monitoring the full-back’s situation carefully and many Liverpool fans fear losing the homegrown star is beginning to look inevitable.
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‘Can only see vvd getting sorted tbh,’ said one concerned supporter on X. ‘Trent is probably already gone. Salah touch and go over length of contract I’d guess.’
‘There’s only one more international break to go for Liverpool to do surprise announcements for VVD, Salah and Trent’s contracts,’ said another fan, conceding time is fast running out.
And another fan posed the questions: ‘Trent won’t sign a new contract. Real offer £20 million in January. What do you do?’
Meanwhile, earlier this month Slot insisted that he is not worried about the ongoing uncertainty as long as the three players continue to perform on the pitch.
‘For me the contract situation could become a problem if the players don’t perform as well as they do at the moment,’ Slot said.
‘Of course it’s not sure that if, if, if they perform not as good any more that it has anything to do with their contract situation.
‘At the moment all three of them are in a good place, all of them perform really, really, really well and there are ongoing discussions, as Virgil said, with the people he has to talk with, and that’s not me as you know. I talk with him to him about other things.
‘Let’s wait and see but all what he said is completely right in that he doesn’t exactly know what the future will be as long as he doesn’t sign the contract yet.’