Liverpool star sold for £25m who wanted return rubs salt in wounds after transfer collapse

Arne Slot is struggling to find the answers

When Liverpool returned to winning ways in midweek against Eintracht Frankfurt, the Reds will have hoped they had turned a corner following their recent losing run.

But alas, they were brought crashing back down to earth away at Brentford on Saturday.

As Arne Slot’s men thrashed the Bundesliga opposition 5-1 in Germany, Frankfurt boss Dino Toppmoller was left to curse a number of his former players.

While Hugo Ekitike scored on his return to his old club, Ibrahima Konate and Dominik Szoboszlai also got their names on the scoresheet against their old RB Leipzig assistant coach.

Yet the shoe was on the other foot for Liverpool on Saturday evening as they came up against a number of familiar faces in the capital.

And while no former Reds got on the scoresheet for Brentford, they still all played their part in the Bees’ 3-2 win.

Jordan Henderson shone in midfield against his old club as he faced off against Liverpool for the first time since leaving the Reds in 2023,

while Caoimhin Kelleher made a number of saves in his own maiden meeting with his former employers since leaving Anfield in the summer.

Meanwhile, Sepp van den Berg impressed at the heart of defence, producing one vital block to deny Mohamed Salah from close-range in particular before helping Keith Andrews’ side see out their 3-2 win.

The Dutchman only made four appearances for Liverpool following his £1.3m arrival in the summer of 2019, but has gone on to shine for Brentford, after successful loans in the Championship and Bundesliga, since moving to the capital in a deal worth up to £25m last year.

And ahead of facing the Reds, he set tongues wagging after revealing that Slot, who previously coached his compatriot at PEC Zwolle when Van den Berg was just a teenager, had actually asked him to stay put at Anfield.

Van den Berg

“I got a tap on my shoulder,” Van den Berg recalled to the Guardian when revealing how he had actually bumped into Slot in Zwolle ahead of his new head coach’s first pre-season at Liverpool.

“I was a bit surprised. And maybe it was a little bit awkward.

“It was just funny … coming from the same hometown, he’d coached me when I was a kid and now he’s the guy at Liverpool.

“He was just like: ‘How’s your off-season been? Have you been working? Are you ready for pre-season?’ I said: ‘Yes, of course.’

“But in my own head, I was thinking: ‘Yeah, I’m ready but hopefully I’m not even coming back for pre-season,’ because I wanted to leave.

“The years before, I never had this feeling of me having a proper chance. A few weeks down the line, he (Slot) was saying: 'You're doing very well. I want you to stay.' If you have the manager of Liverpool saying that, it's not nothing.

"So, of course, I started thinking again. 'Maybe I should stay, maybe I should sign a new contract here.' It was weird. He was open, easy to speak to.

“We're both Dutch, so we are very direct. I like that. He told me: 'You're not going to start but I believe if you stay you will get a chance in the future to start.'".

Van den Berg chose to depart anyway, going on to feature 35 times across all competitions for Brentford last term.

Whether the opportunities promised by Slot would have materialised had he remained is questionable.

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