Trent Alexander-Arnold has given his thoughts on Liverpool’s impressive start to the season under new manager Arne Slot and responded to questions over whether they can win the Premier League
Trent Alexander-Arnold has insisted he is not bothered by people doubting Liverpool’s credentials as Premier League title challengers.
Liverpool currently sit top of the league after picking up seven wins from their first eight games. However, they are just one point above Manchester City and four points above Arsenal, who were viewed as the strongest title contenders ahead of the season.
When asked if that bothered Liverpool, who have entered a new era after Arne Slot replaced Jurgen Klopp as manager, Alexander-Arnold told Sky Sports : “It doesn’t bother me. We had to try and figure out how good we were as a team in a new system and if that system was going to work and obviously it has.
We have a lot of world-class players but a new manager and a new system, so of course on the outside looking in you’re thinking, ‘I don’t know. Can they go and challenge the City’s and Arsenal’s?’
But for us, we were training, we felt good and we got off to a good start. As soon as we came in for the first chat with the manager, it was ‘we want to win things’.” Liverpool are set to take on Arsenal on Sunday in the biggest test of Slot’s reign yet and the Dutchman is well aware of that fact.
“We know how tough an opponent Arsenal are, especially in their own stadium,” Slot told TNT Sports after his side beat RB Leipzig 1-0 in the Champions League. “We faced them the season before on our USA tour where both teams weren’t having all their players in yet.
Arteta has done an amazing job in the last few years. So we know, like against Chelsea and like today, we have to be on top of our game to have a chance to get a result. But we will do everything to get that of course.”
And Gunners boss Mikel Arteta has insisted his side will be “flying” on Sunday, despite their recent injury problems. “We played two nights ago with players coming from internationals after flying from Brazil and many countries,” Arteta said after Arsenal’s 1-0 win over Shakhtar Donetsk in the Champions League.
I was expecting a bit of a drop off. And the fact that we put so much in the first half and didn’t get the distance in terms of the scoreline, I think we paid a bit for that. Then we made life more difficult for us because we started give the ball away in not the right areas and then it was more open.
“That didn’t help. But we have now four days. Believe me, come Sunday we’ll be flying. For sure. We’ll review, have a day off, then two days to prepare the game. Sunday is far and we are more than comfortable that we’ll be in the right place.”
