Boss: What we're working on with Alexander-Arnold and Grujic
Jürgen Klopp has outlined what Trent Alexander-Arnold and Marko Grujic are working on in training to help them reach their vast potential.
Alexander-Arnold was handed the second Premier League start of his fledgling career so far last weekend at Stoke City, but was withdrawn at half-time along with Ben Woodburn as Liverpool introduced Philippe Coutinho and Roberto Firmino to enhance their attacking thrust.
Nevertheless, Klopp is excited by Alexander-Arnold’s prospects, but has stressed the 18-year-old still has plenty to improve upon.
The boss said: “We can talk a little bit about Trent, but I don’t like to talk too much about individual players in a press conference. It is no secret that Trent is an outstanding talent and the good news is he is our boy.
“But if you would ask me where he can – and should – improve, where he has the most potential, still the biggest is in defence.
“He played as a No.6 or No.8 in the U18s, he also played full-back of course, and for us [the first team] he has played full-back, winger and wing-back. In all of these positions, the biggest difference between youth football to adult football is there are only brilliant players around and most of them are as similarly quick as you are, so you have to involve other skills and things in your game.
“That is now the next step for him; not only for him, but the other young boys too.
“He has to improve in everything, but he can and that’s good. For me in this moment, offensively he is closer to his 100 per cent than defence-wise, so that’s what we’re working on.
“The games are not part of education, it’s more the training. We bring him into the games because we think he is ready to do this – we don’t do it because we think we’re not sure he can do it, but let’s try [anyway]. Our situation is much too serious, it’s really too important what we’re doing to do this.
“I spoke to both [Alexander-Arnold and Woodburn] after the game when we came here together again and they were fine. We spoke about it [the substitution], they didn’t like it too much that we made the substitution we did but from my point of view it made sense. I knew they would deal with it really good, but when I spoke with them I was sure that all was OK. They still enjoyed the first half, so that’s nice.”
LFCTV GO: Klopp on Grujic
Meanwhile, Grujic recently returned to contention when he was named on the substitutes’ bench against Everton on April 1 for the first time since November due to injury.
The midfielder – who celebrates his 21st birthday today – was also in reserve for the subsequent encounters with Bournemouth and Stoke.
Klopp said: “He is in very good shape, but unfortunately because of injuries he is not in a real rhythm.
“When we see him in training at the moment, he looks really good football-wise. The position he would play in this moment would be a kind of No.8 and from that position you have to do different things, and a few things are not naturally there in this moment because he didn’t play too often in the last few months. We cannot change this in the moment, so that’s it.
“There would have been different scenarios where he could have played in the last three games, but then the games were always like this and then we had to change like this or another way, so he was not involved. But he is on a very good way and it’s good to have him back.”