Robertson: Trent should see criticism of his game as a compliment 

Andy Robertson feels that Trent -Alexander Arnold will be stronger for the scrutiny that he has faced this season.

With the drop-off in form by the Reds compared to their exceptionally high levels in recent years, there barely seems to be a week that goes by when a pundit looks for key reasons other than the long-term injuries to Virgil Van Dijk, Joe Gomez and Joel Matip.

That has led to the Liverpool and England Right-back being put under the spotlight and the fact that he was not picked for the national team for the two World Cup qualifiers last month only added to the scrutiny.

It was only last year that the 22 year-old was rightly seen as one of the best full-backs in Europe.

But as a professional footballer knows, you have to take the good with the bad and while this analysis can be difficult to hear for a player, in many ways it is a sign of how far Alexander-Arnold has come in such a short space of time. 

Speaking ahead of the Champions League quarter-final second leg against Real Madrid, teammate and close friend Andy Robertson put it in eloquent terms as the Official site reported. 

“For me, I know it’s hard for Trent but he should take it as some sort of compliment, the fact that so much noise has been made about him. 

“But for me and the teammates and for somebody that’s close to him and that cares for him, it’s just about trying to keep his confidence at the highest level because when it’s like that, you know, nobody touches him. 

“I thought on Saturday he put in a very good performance, I thought against Arsenal he was excellent. 

“Of course he struggled against Madrid in midweek but we all did, not one of us played well but more gets said about Trent’s performance than anyone else’s. 

For me, he’s a strong character, he’s always been that since he’s been a young age and that’s why he is where he is – that’s why he’s at the top of the game at a very early age and he’ll come over all the criticism. 

“But it's just about trying to not let it affect him and trying to do what he does on the pitch, because when he does that then I don’t think anyone can touch him.”

Speaking of the task that faces Liverpool this evening, the straight-talking left-back knows there is a sizeable mountain to climb, but the confidence and relief of winning a game at home for the first time since the middle of December will be of benefit to the team.

“Our run at home has not been good enough since Boxing Day in terms of the points that we’ve dropped [and] the defeats that we’ve came to.

 “It’s simply not been good enough and to then get our first win of the new year there, it always makes a difference and then when you walk on that pitch tomorrow you get good feelings instead of negative ones, which have maybe been the case the last couple of weeks [with] the performances and the results we’ve had here. But we’ll go into tomorrow full of confidence.

“Of course Real Madrid are hot favourites and so they should be with the aggregate [lead] they’ve got.

"But it’s up to us to leave everything on the pitch, give a better performance than we did last week and give ourselves the best possible chance to progress because we don’t want to give up on our chances of getting through and we won’t do that until the last whistle has been blown. 

"We know how hard a task it’s going to be and we know we probably need an as-close-to-perfect performance as we can."

Parallels have been drawn between the task that Liverpool face tonight and the miracle at Anfield against Barcelona two years ago.

While the Reds are better placed in terms of how the tie is placed with an away goal to their name, the lack of fanatical home fans helping push the team over the line makes this an incredibly difficult task to overcome as Robertson conceded.

“Barcelona that night obviously was an incredible night and it wouldn't have been possible without the 55,000 fans in there, that's a fact. The noise at the start, the noise they made when we scored the first, it just carried on and they got louder and louder as the night went on. 

“Unfortunately, tomorrow night we won't have that. But we're coming up against the team that's the most experienced in this tournament, won it the most times in the short history and the long history. 

“They're a fantastic team full of quality and it's a big task for us. It's not the same as the Barcelona game and we can't rely [on] the fact that we came back from that game, [and] that we're going to come back from this one.

“We've got to aim to win the game, first and foremost, and once we do that then let's see what the aggregate score is and let's see what we need to do. Our determination is to take our chances, to keep a clean sheet and hopefully make it as uncomfortable a night for them as possible.”