- Trent Alexander-Arnold joined Liverpool in 2004 at the age of six
- Right-back was promoted to the senior side in 2016
- Anfield player has opened up on the realities of academy football
"You've got more chance of winning the lottery than making it as a professional footballer," Liverpool star Trent Alexander-Arnold told Sky Sports as he reflected on his journey in the game.
The Anfield defender understands the realities of academy football more than most, spending almost all of his life with the Reds after joining their youth side in 2004 at the age of only six. But what sounds like a dream to most actually comes with tough truths, with academies often unable to offer players a career beyond youth football.
"I got my big break at the age of six," Alexander-Arnold explained
"It was just like a half-term camp that the academy was doing. They sent invites to a few schools in the community and luckily my school was one of them. As you can imagine, every hand in the class went up so the only way to do it was pick names out of a hat. Luckily my name got pulled out.
"I think it teaches you a lot, I think it instills discipline, the sacrifice, the hard work, everything that you need to go and achieve what you want. You don't just get it handed to you, you work and earn it every single day. It's a level of competitiveness against some of your closest friends to outwork them and be better than them because you need to fight for your next contract and make it to the next step.
"Whether you do or don't make it, you're prepared for life itself because you know what it takes and you know that even to have the smallest chance, which is what we all have the tiniest little chance to ever make it, you have to fight day in day out."
Alexander-Arnold was promoted to Liverpool's senior side in 2016 and relished the opportunity to play with the stars.
"There's nothing like it," he continued. "The best under-21 games you can ever play in won't even come close to a first-team training session. I was scared of making mistakes in simple passing drills so pressure kind of rolled into added concentration.
"It was like, okay I'm passing to Jordan Henderson the captain I've got to make sure it's a precise pass because the last thing I want to do is give him a bad ball and the same goes for every single player. The respect I had for them was like, okay I need to be at your level.
"In the academy you see players go and train with the first team once or twice and then come back down, that was probably the biggest fear I had and I always thought to myself once I'm in and around the first team I never want to go back."
