Football News

Trent Alexander-Arnold: ‘I’d been planning Kylian Mbappe tribute for a while’

By Ollie Thomas

Published: 17:30, 6 March 2020

Trent Alexander-Arnold has revealed his Kylian Mbappe ‘tribute’ celebration had been planned for “about three or four months”.

The Liverpool full-back unleashed the iconic ‘folded arms’ stance after scoring during his magnificent performance away at Leicester earlier this season.

Trent vs Mbappe: Five things to know…

  • Alexander-Arnold and Mbappe are regarded as two of the best youngsters in the world.
  • They are both 21 years of age.
  • Between them, they’ve won league titles, the Champions League, domestic cups, the Club World Cup and the World Cup.
  • Mbappe has been linked with a move to Liverpool this summer.
  • The two have a great relationship with each other, with a lot of mutual respect.

Alexander-Arnold is well on his way to securing his first league title at the age of just 21 — something which may mean some start to see him in a similar light as Mbappe.

The PSG forward is widely regarded as the best young player in the world, so much so that he has been heavily linked with a move away from the French capital to Real Madrid, or even to join Alexander-Arnold on Merseyside.

The pair seem to get along well and often speak highly of each other in interviews, as Alexander-Arnold did in his recent interview with BBC Sport.

When asked about the folded arms celebration, he said: “[It’s] Mbappe’s celebration!

“It’s something I do with my mates… we joke around. Obviously I don’t score too much, and I was saying for ages that I’d do it when I next scored, and I think it was about three or four months between my two goals, so I’d been planning it for a while!”

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“We believe we can win the Euros”

Alexander-Arnold is likely to be England’s right-back when Gareth Southgate’s side take on the rest of Europe this summer.

Hopes are high for the Three Lions, with many believing that this crop of players is capable of achieving big things with the national team — after all, World Cup and Nations League semi-finals account to a good start.

The Liverpool full-back echoed this belief, adding: “[We can] win it, why not?

“You’ve seen at the World Cup we got far, you can see that the squad is so exciting at the moment. It’s really encouraging, so for us as players, why would we say we can only get to the quarter-finals?

“That would be strange. We all believe we can win it.”