Trent: I use mauling by Marcus as motivation

IT STILL hurts. It doesn’t matter that it was 11 months ago, Trent Alexander-Arnold can still feel the sting of that Saturday night as he worked out what words to punch into his phone.

Old Trafford may have been the scene of one of the best moments of his young career, the stadium where he first played in the Premier League, but last March it was the venue for 90 minutes that were so chastening he felt obliged to tweet a public apology.

Marcus Rashford, his good friend, had scored twice to give Manchester united a 2-1 win and both goals came after he stepped inside Alexander-Arnold. Losing the fixture regarded as English football’s Clasico is bad enough but feeling responsible as a local boy makes it 10 times worse.

You could understand, perhaps, if Liverpool’s dynamic young right back had never watched the footage of Rashford spinning him like a top but the reality is different. The video nasty, he felt, had to become essential viewing if he wanted to become more than just a promising novice.

‘I still use it as a learning point,’ he says, as he prepares to return to Old Trafford. ‘It is the best thing to do. You look back on the harder games, the tough ones, learn what I didn’t do well and what I could have done better.

‘Rather than let it get me down and think maybe I’m not good enough at this level, it was important to use it as a positive and see it as a learning step to get better. I needed to use it as motivation to make sure something like that doesn’t happen again, to prove you are better than you showed.’

There was never any question Alexander-Arnold would do so. Starting in a Champions League final and going to the World Cup shows the regard in which the 20-year- old is held and, with 69 appearances, he is Liverpool’s most successful Academy graduate since Steven Gerrard.

BuT the road to the top can never be smooth and it is why, as his club prepare to take on united at Old Trafford again tomorrow, he will remember what Rashford did. The last thing he — or Liverpool — need is to be caught out with the stakes so high.

‘If he isn’t world- class now, he can definitely reach that level,’ Alexander-Arnold insists. ‘Marcus is going to be a really special player. He will say he has a lot to learn and improve on but he is showing signs of wanting to work hard and get better. under his new manager, he’s doing that.

‘I’d say that game was the hardest point of my career. Afterwards, it was about getting back to basics. You can’t think you are not good enough at that level — maybe the level was too good for where you were at that time. It is important to put it behind you.’

Everything, after all, is in front of him and his team. This, potentially, could be one of the greatest campaigns in Liverpool’s history — how could it not be considered so if they trump such a brilliant Manchester City team? — and the positive spin-off from winning on enemy territory would be huge.

One consequence would be the settling of nerves. Liverpool have been top for most of the last two months but it doesn’t seem as if the position has been enjoyed, and Alexander-Arnold understands better than most the tension supporters have felt. For three weeks, Alexander- Arnold sat among them as he overcame a knee ligament injury. It was, he says, torturous. He was cast back to the role of boyhood fan, watching from the sidelines.

‘That aspect of being a player goes out of the window when you can’t play, once you don’t have to prepare yourself mentally to go out and play,’ Alexander-Arnold explains. ‘ You are sat there, supporting the lads, but you get caught up in the emotions.

‘It was absolutely horrible. You are a fully-fledged fan of the club, so it’s hard not to be passionate about how the games go. When you are on the pitch, you feel you can influence it. You have control.’

And control is exactly what Liverpool will need. Before these sides first met on December 15, it felt inevitable Jurgen Klopp’s team would run amok. Now there is a sense they are walking into an ambush and a united side that is playing with a style true to its heritage and ready to lay siege.

It is the kind of test potential champions must negotiate and a game for the wider audience to savour. This is what football is all about and there is a glint in the defender’s eye as he sums it all up.

‘Everyone feels the same way,’ he says. ‘Keep our heads and not get caught up in everything going on around us. We will be going into battle with them. Hopefully we will come out on top.’