Photo by Michael Mayhew/Sportsphoto/Allstar via Getty Images
Photo by Michael Mayhew/Sportsphoto/Allstar via Getty Images
Trent Alexander-Arnold and Ibrahima Konate have been the latest to learn in recent times that Liverpool fans do not always take player exits well.
Like Michael Owen before them, Alexander-Arnold and Konate both left the Reds to join Real Madrid, and – just like Owen – their legacies at Anfield will never be the same.
For Owen, it was not necessarily joining Madrid that was the issue. There had been a feeling for a while that he may eventually look to move on, and, at the time, Los Blancos were not seen as a particularly problematic destination. What has instead tarnished the former striker in the eyes of just about every Liverpool supporter was his decision to move to Manchester United in 2009.
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Owen has consistently failed to see the issue with his decision, and has spoken several times since his retirement in 2013 to decry the lack of appreciation he receives from Liverpool fans, despite scoring 158 times for the club as an academy graduate. Now, 17 years on from his arrival at United, Owen has once again reiterated that he will not apologise for his perceived betrayal.
Owen loved his time at Man United
When Owen joined United, he was nothing like the player who left Liverpool five years earlier. Injuries had taken their toll and left him as a shell of the lethal striker who won the Ballon d’Or in 2001. As he revealed in a new interview with Sky Sports this Friday, it says it all that Hull and Everton were the two clubs trying to sign him before United swooped in.
“I think Hull City actually were the first team to show an interest and then Everton,” he said. “And I’m sat here thinking, ‘with all due respect, I think I’m too good for for Hull.’ And just as I was deliberating what to do and hoping that other teams would come in to give me a choice, Sir Alex Ferguson called. In the meantime, of course, I’d phoned Liverpool to see if they were interested in signing me, but they weren’t.
“Of course, I thought, ‘oh, Liverpool fans are going to hate me if I sign here.’ But what? What do you want me to do? You know, if Liverpool fans knew what had happened behind the scenes that I had basically begged [Rafa] Benitez, if they knew the story, then they would think very differently. But of course, I couldn’t tell them that.”
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“The last thing I’m going to do is apologise for going to Manchester United, because the fans were great with me, the people were great with me, I absolutely loved my time there. But I do understand as well for the people that don’t know the background thinking ‘you played for them, you played for them, right? That must mean you’re a traitor or that must mean you’re disloyal or must mean whatever else.’ I’ve just got to accept that.”
Owen clarifies why he left Liverpool
Owen has stated many times that he always wanted to come back to Liverpool after leaving for Real Madrid in 2004. In fact, the former England international now says that it was a belief that he could one day return to Anfield which made his mind up to accept the chance to play for the Spanish giants.
“Well, leaving Liverpool was probably the hardest decision of my career. I never thought the day would come, certainly not,” he said.
“And then when I had the opportunity, when my agent phoned me and said that Madrid are interested in buying you, then, I mean, to say I was torn was an understatement.
“I never expected or never wanted to leave Liverpool, but I could be sat here now talking to you and saying, you know what, at one point I was offered to go to Real Madrid and I said no, and I would definitely have regretted it, because I would never have known what it would have been like. Part of me was saying, don’t worry, you can always come back, Ian Rush did it. He went away to Juventus and he came back. And I suppose that’s what convinced me at the end of the day to think, do you know what? I’ve got to do it. I’ve got to go and try it.
“Of course, I went to Madrid, had a great time, but when I wanted to come back, it could never work. It was just never the right time, unfortunately, despite my best attempts. So that’s one of the sad things about my career. I never got to come back and to play for Liverpool.”
Owen came closest to coming back to Liverpool only one year after leaving, when the Reds bid £10m to sign him from Madrid. With Owen desperate to return, though, Graeme Souness and Newcastle swooped in and put more money on the table.
“Liverpool were prepared to pay 10 million for me, but just when I thought I was going, Newcastle slapped 16 million on the table to Real Madrid, and the president at the time came and saw me and he said, ‘you’re either staying at Real Madrid or you’re going to Newcastle, one or the other. But unless Liverpool bid 16 million, you’re certainly not going there,'” Owen recalls.
Had the Reds matched Newcastle, Owen’s story would have gone very, very differently. However, even with a Liverpool comeback off the table, he still could have respected the club who gave him a career and turned Alex Ferguson down when he called. Owen refuses to apologise, and that is his right, but Liverpool fans are unlikely to change their opinions on him as a result.
Photo by Chesnot/Getty Images
Photo by Chesnot/Getty Images
Jeff Bezos speaks onstage ahead of US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth at Blue Origin in Cape Canaveral, Florida (Credit: Getty Images/Mguel J. Rodriguez Carrillo/AFP).
Jeff Bezos speaks onstage ahead of US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth at Blue Origin in Cape Canaveral, Florida (Credit: Getty Images/Mguel J. Rodriguez Carrillo/AFP).
Photo by Nikki Dyer/Liverpool FC via Getty Images
Photo by Nikki Dyer/Liverpool FC via Getty Images