Liverpool have ALREADY set foundation for Xabi Alonso arrival

Xabi Alonso is a free man - and that might just tempt Liverpool. They’ve already set the foundations for his arrival.

Xabi Alonso parted company with Real Madrid this week. It comes just months after he signed a contract to join his former club - and that was after a year-long wait to take the role.

But it also wasn’t a massive shock. Reports had been rampant for a while now that Alonso wasn’t entirely accepted by the players at Real Madrid and that it was a clash of ideas.

He’s now positioned to take on a new job in 2026, mainly because of how Real Madrid structured his contract. There will be plenty of clubs linked with him, too, and one of those is undeniably Liverpool.

Arne Slot’s position has come under scrutiny shortly after winning the Premier League. That’ll happen when a team goes through their worst run of form for 70 years.

Alonso now offers an obvious alternative and it feels as though the Reds have already laid the foundations for it.

Liverpool's 'Xabi Alonso' team

Alonso differs from Slot in one key way: his winning system was a 3-4-3 rather than a 4-2-3-1. And if you consider that a hallmark of what he tries to do, this Liverpool squad looks like a better fit for the former than it does the latter.

This is a team that deliberately didn't sign a winger in the summer. Instead, they brought in two proper wing-backs - full-backs who look to attack and offer the team's width. One of them played under Alonso at Bayer Leverkusen. It's a way of thinking that's far more in-line with a back three than a back four.

They didn't bring in out-and-out defensive midfielders, instead keeping versatile midfielders suited to a flat two. But importantly, Liverpool did try and sign an extra senior centre-back in Marc Guehi.

£100m was spent on Alonso's star player: Florian Wirtz. If he were to play the same role he did at Leverkusen - part of the front three but slightly withdrawn and to the left - Liverpool didn't sign any competition against him. In fact, they sold Luis Diaz and didn't replace him.

There's a solid argument that Mo Salah fits Alonso's system more than Slot's at this stage. He'd be a perfect choice on the right of the front three - a more central role that has the width provided by the wing-back.

If Liverpool truly did want to bring in Alonso, the foundation is firmly there. All they'd actually need to do is grab a new centre-back, providing Ibrahima Konate stays and Giovanni Leoni recovers.

We wouldn't expect anything to happen before the summer but if it does, Liverpool are well-suited to adapt to Alonso. Like they'd been planning for it.

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