InterviewTrent Alexander-Arnold: This is the best time of the season – it's pure football

The Reds kicked off their December schedule with a 2-0 victory over Manchester City at Anfield on Sunday afternoon to move nine points clear at the top of the Premier League standings.

They will visit both Newcastle United and city rivals Everton this week, with a further six games to follow across all competitions throughout the month.

And the No.66 has revealed he is looking forward to a period he considers to be 'pure football'.

"It's always the way when it comes to this time of the season," he told Liverpoolfc.com. "Games come thick and fast.

"But when you've got momentum and are in a good run of form like we are now, we're excited for them. I think a lot of lads would agree with me when saying that this is the best time of the season if anything really.

"It's pure football. There's nothing else you have time to think about. It's just pure football. You play, you recover, you prepare, you play, you recover – it's just a continuous cycle of that. And when you love what you do and when you love playing and being out there on the pitch then you can't get enough of it."

Read on for the rest of the interview with Alexander-Arnold on Liverpool's momentum, the trip to Newcastle and more…

On the fixture list in December…

Every game is so important. I think it's probably the most important month of the season – I've always believed that. If you have a good December, because you play so many games in the space of a month, if you can get through that with a lot of wins and not drop many points then you're heading into the second half of the season in an incredible position. Being in a strong position like we are now, if we can keep that up then I'm sure there will be teams in and around us that will drop points.

On how much energy and confidence can be taken from recent results...

It's probably a little bit of both. When you're playing well and you're winning games, of course you feel good and you feel on top of the world. Also, we've had that confidence in the game plans that the manager and the coaching staff give us. We believe in them and we go out there and try to execute them as best we can. With the previous games that we've had, we're full of confidence. We believe that we can beat any team and we've proven that so far this season. We've shown how good of a team and how good players we are. We've very, very hard to beat – clearly. So, we go into games with confidence and I think that's rightly so.

On facing Newcastle...

People always talk about previous games and form going into games; I think in the Premier League that's something that doesn't really matter. Every game is incredibly difficult and I think teams will always have that extra motivation when they're playing us. We're sitting top of the league, we're probably the best team in the league so far this season, so of course teams are going to have extra motivation.

They know that they need to be at 100 per cent to have a chance to beat us and we understand that. We need to be at our best and they'll always have a point to prove. In these situations, teams that are able to get a result against us, it can transform their season and kick-start their season, so that will be motivation. For us, it's just about churning out results and getting wins [at] home or away – it doesn't really matter to us. Every game we target getting three points.

On the atmosphere expected at St. James' Park...

It's a big game with a lot of history in it. Their fans will be up for it. We came away from there with an incredible result last season... so that might add a bit of fuel to their fire. But for us it's full focus. We don't get too thrown by opposition fans. It will be an incredible atmosphere – as it always is up there – and it's one that we're all looking forward to playing.