The Scotland skipper is poised to leave Anfield this summer after falling out of favour under Arne Slot
16:37, 13 Feb 2026
Liverpool vice-skipper Andy Robertson
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Liverpool vice-skipper Andy Robertson(Image: Liverpool FC via Getty Images)
Gordon Strachan has told Andy Robertson he needs to become a major influence at his new club - but doubts it will be Celtic.
Robertson, 31, is poised to leave Liverpool this summer as he reaches the end of his contract, with clubs ready to pounce on a free transfer. The Champions League-winning defender almost joined English rivals Tottenham Hotspur in January - before Arne Slot blocked the move.
After falling behind £40million signing Milos Kerkez in the pecking order, vice-skipper Robertson is ready to pull down the curtain on an extraordinary nine years at Anfield, where he has lifted every major honour possible - including two Premier League titles.
The Scotland captain has been touted for a return to Parkhead - 17 years after being released as a schoolboy by his boyhood club for being too small.
But Strachan - the man who handed Robbo his first international cap in 2014 - believes Kieran Tierney's role as first-choice left-back would scupper any potential move.
He told BetVictor Casino: "Andy Robertson has to go somewhere where he has influence. At this moment, Andy doesn’t have the influence he had two, three, four, or five years ago when he was an integral part, especially with Sadio Mane and Mohamed Salah.
"They played centrally, Salah and Mane, and he was wide, he used to get out wide from his left-back position. He was integral. The other side was the same with Trent Alexander-Arnold. So the width came from there.
"Salah and Mane played centrally when he was a huge influence. And it's great when you're a huge influence in a club. It gives you energy, gives you pride.
Ex-Scotland boss Gordon Strachan
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Ex-Scotland boss Gordon Strachan(Image: Russell Cheyne/Shutterstock)
"He's not had that in the last year or so. He's in and out of the team. They play with wingers more often than not now. They're wider now. Cody Gakpo's up there, and Salah's out on the other side. So it's harder for Andy and full-backs to get through.
"The most important thing at the moment for his career is what I got at Man United when I went to Leeds in '89. What happened? I became an influence again in the dressing room, on the pitch. And because of that, I played for the next, I don't know, six years because of that influence.
"I feel that he has to find somewhere he's going to be an influence, where players listen to him when he speaks, and when he performs, people look at him and go, ‘Wow, like that, that's what I want to be.’
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"So he needs to find a club like that. It's unfortunate about Celtic having Kieran Tierney in that sense, I think coming back to the place where he started would have been a great, great thing for him. But I think that might be a problem now because you have Kieran Tierney there.
"So for me, it's not about what league it is, it's where he's going to be of most influence for himself because he's earned it right now after all the years of great football to go anywhere he wants to enjoy himself for whatever seasons he has left."
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