Liverpool's Dilemma: Xabi Alonso's Past and Future at Anfield
Liverpool are not simply drawing up a shortlist. They are conducting an autopsy.
Before they even think about handing Xabi Alonso the keys to Anfield as a potential successor to Arne Slot, the club want answers. As reported by AS, senior figures at Liverpool are determined to understand why one of their most elegant former midfielders crashed so dramatically at Real Madrid.
They cannot afford another misstep. Not now.
Slot’s Empire Cracking
Slot arrived as the man to modernise Liverpool and, at first, he delivered. His debut campaign brought a comfortable Premier League title, a statement of continuity after the Jürgen Klopp era and proof, it seemed, that the club’s recruitment model still worked.
That sheen has vanished in a single, chaotic season.
Despite spending over €400 million on the squad, Liverpool’s 2025-26 campaign has unravelled. They are out of the Champions League, out of the FA Cup, out of the League Cup – all before any of those competitions truly reached boiling point. Their league title defence? Long gone. The champions now trail leaders Arsenal by 20 points and sit fourth, a distant, frustrated shadow of last year’s side.
The criticism has followed in waves. Slot’s game model, so admired in that first season, has come under heavy and often brutal scrutiny. His training sessions, his in-game adjustments, his man-management – all of it has been pulled apart in the English media. Inside the club, at the very least, the idea of a managerial change is no longer taboo. It is being weighed, tested, discussed.
Slot is under contract until 2027. On paper, that offers security. In reality, it only raises the stakes.
The Allure – and Risk – of Alonso
Into this storm steps the name that has hovered over Anfield for months: Xabi Alonso.
Long seen as the natural heir to the Liverpool dugout, Alonso has been painted as the romantic choice – the former midfield conductor returning to orchestrate a new era. But romance does not erase risk, and his recent past in Madrid has turned what looked like a straightforward succession plan into a far more complex equation.
Reports from Spain describe a Real Madrid dressing room split almost down the middle during Alonso’s tenure. The tension escalated in October, when some of the club’s biggest stars, including Vinicius Junior and Fede Valverde, openly challenged his methods. They bristled at lengthy tactical sessions. They grew impatient with extended video analysis. For players used to a looser, more trust-based regime under Carlo Ancelotti, Alonso’s intensity felt suffocating.
Yet that was only half the story.
Another group inside the same dressing room backed him fully. They believed in his attempt to overhaul the system and style, to drag Madrid into a more structured, demanding version of itself. For them, the complaints – especially from Vinicius – were not about tactics at all. They were about status. Under Alonso, the Brazilian no longer enjoyed the same untouchable position he had held with Ancelotti. The friction, they felt, stemmed from ego as much as ideology.
A Nursery in Madrid
What happened next will be studied closely on Merseyside.
According to multiple reports, the level of disrespect from some Madrid players crossed any normal line between player and coach. A few are said to have pretended to fall asleep during tactical meetings. Others reportedly chatted while Alonso addressed the squad. The atmosphere turned toxic, not just for Alonso but for the players who still believed in him.
The reaction from the coach was explosive. He is reported to have snapped in one session, stunned by what he saw in front of him. “I didn’t realise I’d walked into a nursery here,” he is said to have shouted, a line that captured both his disbelief and his fury.
When the dust settled, Alonso was out. He remains without a club.
For Liverpool, that meltdown is not a footnote. It is central to the debate. Was Alonso a visionary trying to drag a complacent dressing room into a more demanding era? Or a talented but inflexible coach who misread the dynamics of a star-studded squad and lost the room?
Liverpool’s Calculated Gamble
These are not abstract questions at Anfield.
Liverpool’s current squad contains its own big personalities, its own established stars, and a dressing room still shaped by the emotional imprint of Klopp. Any new manager must command respect immediately, but also navigate egos, expectations and the pressure of a fanbase that now considers title challenges a minimum, not a dream.
Alonso’s methods – detailed, intense, tactically heavy – could be exactly what a drifting team needs. They could also ignite the same kind of resistance that tore Madrid apart.
So Liverpool dig. They ask. They analyse. Why did it collapse in Spain? Where did Alonso stand in that internal war? Was he the problem, or the one trying to solve it?
Slot’s future hangs in the balance while those questions swirl. Alonso’s next step does too.
One club, one former legend, and one brutal season now converge on a single decision: is Xabi Alonso the man to rescue Liverpool’s project, or the next risk they cannot afford to take?
