Liverpool youngster Trent Alexander-Arnold on how Jurgen Klopp revealed World Cup call-up news

Trent Alexander-Arnold has revealed how “father figure” Jürgen Klopp delivered the news of his call-up to England’s World Cup squad.

The uncapped 19-year-old was last week named in Gareth Southgate’s 23-man squad for this summer’s tournament in Russia on the back of an impressive break-out year at Liverpool.

Alexander-Arnold will compete with Kieran Tripper for England’s right wing-back berth and will travel to the tournament as a Champions League winner if he and his club team-mates find a way past Real Madrid in Kiev on Saturday.

Southgate allowed Klopp to deliver the good news to Alexander-Arnold, telling the Liverpool manager he would do “all the horrible phone calls”, and on Monday the youngster revealed how he found out about his call-up.

“The manager told me when we were away last week,” Alexander-Arnold recalled, a week on from Liverpool’s pre-Champions League final training camp in Marbella. “We were on the shuttle bus towards the plane, and he came over to me.

“He asked: ‘Have you heard anything from the national team?’ I said: ‘No, no’. So he replied: ‘When is it getting announced?’ I was like: ‘About 12, 1 maybe.’

“And when we were in mid-air he came over and asked: ‘Well, have you got any holidays booked this year around World Cup time?’ and I said: ‘No’ and he knew and said: ‘Well, Gareth Southgate’s been on the phone and told me to let you know you’re in the squad.’”

Alexander-Arnold hailed Klopp for showing faith in him this year, adding: “I said thank you to the boss because without him I wouldn’t be where I am now.

“The faith and trust he has in me is why I’ve played so much and been able to develop. The way he treats me in training and the way he goes about it with the young players is unbelievable.

“He really is a father figure to us all. We try to do what he says and hopefully I can make him proud on Saturday.”

Alexander-Arnold is still learning his trade as a full back having originally played in Liverpool’s youth set-up as a midfielder and the West Derby-born youngster is now preparing for the sternest test of his career.

His opponent on Saturday will be Cristiano Ronaldo, the all-time leading goalscorer of the Champions League era and though Alexander-Arnold can take heart from his displays against Manchester City’s Leroy Sané in the quarter-finals, he knows shackling the Portuguese will be an altogether different challenge.

“Most opponents aren’t Ronaldo! You have to show him respect but not too much, because that’s when you get taken advantage of,” Alexander-Arnold said at Liverpool’s pre-final media day on Monday.

“You have a job to do and whoever I am up against I will try to come out on top like I always try.”

Playing against Mohamed Salah in training every day will help, at least. The Egyptian has 44 goals to his name this season – exactly the same amount as Ronaldo.

“Obviously, the right preparation for these kind of tests is training against world-class players like Mo,” Alexander-Arnold said. “All the team push each other every single day, and every day we see an improvement in all of us.

“We’ve come a long way this season and hopefully at the weekend we can top it off.”