Some have already 
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He’s an immensely talented football player about to hit his prime - Alonso (I’m taking his appointment at Real Madrid as a given) will make sure that he makes the most out of him. Alonso is tactically astute and adaptable, and he has a lot of such players at his disposal - I’m sure he’ll make the most out of TAA. If nothing else, his set-pieces are worth the signing-on fee alone.
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No, I’m talking summer 2020 when people were talking about cashing in on him so we could buy Thiago.
It’s similar to when people now say they were always massive fans of Alonso, but the sentiment on TIA back in 2008 was very much that we ought to sell Alonso to buy Barry, probably 60-40 or something like that.
Yeah that’s pretty much what I mean. Unless we’re waiting on some player like we did for Konaté, I don’t think we’ll leave a gap in right-back.
I’m not sure where Alexander-Arnold would fit for us in midfield though?
Speaking on beIN Sports covering the Champions League on Tuesday night, Arsene Wenger claimed that Real Madrid approached Trent Alexander-Arnold a “long, long time ago”:
“I believe the Trent transfer shows a new trend in the game – there are no transfers anymore for the big, big players,” began Wenger, who now enjoys a role as FIFA Chief of Global Football Development.
“They all go at the end of their contract. Because the wages are so high, you can’t pay the transfer anymore.”
“So what do the big clubs do? They say two years before the end of the contract: ‘We want to buy you, we give you these wages, and we will try to make an offer to your club’”.
“If it doesn’t work, they come back next year, and if not, they take you for free. That’s what they did with Mbappe as well.”
When probed on when Real Madrid unofficially approached Alexander-Arnold, Wenger smiled and said:
“Real Madrid approached Alexander-Arnold a long, long time ago.”
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Tapping up used to be frowned upon. It seems to be an accepted tactic now.I suppose it will only stop when a lot of players discover that the greener grass is plastic.
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It’s probably only few clubs who can do that. Entice top players to join on a free. Real being one I suppose.
I remember it used to be a massive deal but I feel like since we backed off from van Dijk, then ended up signing him anyway, no one seems the slightest bit interested anymore.
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We were wrong to approach VVD the way we had. But it wasn’t as if we were the only sides that made that approach.
Every club wanted him and probably made enquiries
Southampton probably got pissed off because Virgil stopped them getting an even bigger fee by deciding he only wanted to join us.
And hence , them reporting us.
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God, remember the shit storm over Heinze? By having conversations with his agent that allowed him to disclose the existence of this clause, and doing so without Utd’s permission, that constituted tapping up and made the clause not applicable to us.
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Already seen a couple of times that Konate is Reals next target on a free
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They may well have interest, and with a highly regarded french international going into the final year of his contract you would expect every top side in europe to have their feelers out. But their need at CB is greater than their need at RB ever was. That ability to scrape through a couple of years was what allowed them the patience to wait for Trent to become available. They dont have that ability to wait at CB. That doesnt mean they wont go back into the market next summer as well, but by adding a front line CB this summer it would make the obviousness of the fit for Ibou lessened and maybe less attractive all around.
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That’s wasn’t what happened. It was, at worst a misunderstanding on our part.
Van Dijk had an agreement with Southampton that he could talk to clubs that had qualified for the champions league. As we had finished fourth that season, we assumed that included us and so did Van Dijk.
The problem was that that in those days fourth meant you had to play a qualifying round (we beat Hoffenheim in the end I think)
Southampton had a shit fit and said that their agreement with Van Dijk did not include us as we had not yet fully qualified. And they would have probably been brought around by throwing a few million quid extra quid at it until Tom Werner got pissed at that event and rubbed their noses in it.
It wasn’t as simple as we tapped him up - the club believed they had permission to speak to Van Dijk.
That’s why I think we pull the trigger on him this summer. We have to get tougher with players like this.
It’s a World Cup year and I don’t think Ibou fancies finding himself down the pecking order and not getting games.
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Liverpool to escape punishment for alleged tapping-up of Virgil van Dijk | Liverpool | The Guardian.
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How do you even know this? Never heard that all…
Can you provide any reputable link?
Retrospectively, I’m happy Trent waited until after the title was won to announce his departure.
I hope Real Madrid ends up miserable, and him joining them doesn’t change that hope.
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Where did you read about this ?
Because I do remember Man City going in for Virgil too. As did Chelsea and probably Arsenal.
Problem solved…
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