Gabby Agbonlahor thinks Trent Alexander-Arnold could be a weak-link in the Liverpool defence this evening.
Speaking to TalkSPORT, Agbonlahor shared his opinion that Villarreal should try to emulate Anthony Gordon’s performance against the Liverpool right-back last Sunday.
“How good was Gordon on Trent (Alexander) Arnold,” said the pundit. “I know Trent Arnold’s an amazing footballer but he’s the weakness defending. So if I’m Villarreal tonight, I’m putting my quickest player possible on that left-hand side on Trent Arnold. Gordon, every time he was up against him he got past him.
“That would be my tactics, even though you’d probably have Konate come over to cover anyway, but it would probably be to try that right-back side.”
Let’s hope Unai Emery didn’t have TalkSPORT on the radio while the Villarreal team bus headed into Liverpool!
Heard it all before
The tropes about Trent’s perceived lack of defensive ability were bound to rear their head after he had a tricky afternoon in the Merseyside Derby.
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As noted by Ian Wright, the Scouser didn’t have his best day with his passing at Anfield. More worryingly, he struggled against Anthony Gordon, who gave him some issues.
But that’s bound to happen every so often to every single defender in the game. Time and again the Scouser has proved himself more than capable when facing the very best wingers in the game.
Arnaut Danjuma doesn’t necessarily fall into that category, but he is likely to be the man Trent is tasked with stopping tonight.
In the absence of Gerard Moreno, Danjuma is The Yellow Submarine’s biggest goal threat. He will need to kept quiet and Alexander-Arnold will have a big say in whether he is or not.
For Danjuma’s part, he is most looking forward to facing Virgil Van Dijk, rather than Liverpool’s number 66. Let’s hope that he doesn’t get any change out of either of them.
After allowing the dissenting voices to creep back in, Alexander-Arnold usually answers them emphatically. If Trent should somehow listen to Agbonlahor’s predictable analysis, he’ll be desperate to show it to be nonsense tonight.