Five Big Stars That Liverpool Allowed to Leave as Free Agents

- - Players

Red Exit SignMuch can change in a short space of time, so by the time you’re reading this the landscape may have altered once more, but it’s possible that in the summer of 2025, three of the greatest players ever to pull on the red shirt could leave Liverpool on a free.

Reports suggest that Trent Alexander-Arnold will finally make his long-rumoured move to Real Madrid at the end of the 2024/25 season. The marauding right back has been linked with a switch to the Bernabeu for a number of years, and with his Liverpool contract coming to an end on June 30, it seems now is the time that TAA will head to Spain.

Mo Salah, meanwhile, is still yet to commit to a new deal at the time of writing. After enjoying one of his best ever seasons, the hope is that the Egyptian will put pen to paper… but at this stage, leaving the club on a free in the summer is not off the table.

And then there’s Virgil van Dijk, who could also walk away from Anfield when his contract ends on June 30.

It’s remarkable to think that one of the biggest clubs in the world, on the back of plenty of success under head coach Arne Slot, could simply lose such key figures. Van Dijk would be a margin call – at 34 and with serious knee injuries on his ledger, maybe now is the time for a fresh start at centre back.

But TAA, at 26, is in his pomp, while Salah – despite turning 32 – is on the cusp of one of the best individual seasons in Premier League history.

The lessons of the past clearly haven’t been learned, as a number of other key players have left Liverpool – some at their peak of their powers…

Steve McManaman

There is, unfortunately, a lineage of Liverpool players setting sail for Real Madrid in their mid-20s.

In his own way, Steve McManaman was one of the club’s worst losses as a free agent in the summer of 1999. He was routinely one of Liverpool’s best players throughout the nineties, and while the team at the time wasn’t in a position to challenge for major honours, they did lift the FA Cup and League Cup with ‘Macca’ in the side.

But he hankered after a move away, both to test himself on international soil and, perhaps, make more money. Real came knocking, and made McManaman an offer that would see him become the highest paid British player in history.

With 272 appearances, 46 goals and many more assists, McManaman was – at the age of 27 – perhaps the most devastating Bosman transfer loss that Liverpool FC has ever experienced.

Gini Wijnaldum

For a player with such an illustrious history at the club, it was mind boggling that Gini Wijnaldum was allowed to walk away for free and join PSG in 2021.

And it wasn’t as if he had fallen out of favour with Jurgen Klopp either; remarkably, given that he plays in midfield, the Dutchman was an ever-present in the Premier League during his final 2020/21 campaign with the club, playing 51 times in all.

A part of both the Premier League and Champions League title hoists in 2019 and 2020, Wijnaldum will always be a Liverpool club legend – it’s just a shame that he was allowed to leave for free at the end of a season in which he was such a key player.

Roberto Firmino

It’s amazing to think that Bobby Firmino was only 31 when he left Liverpool in the summer of 2023.

He was never a player that relied on speed and power anyway; instead, Firmino’s quickness of thought and intelligence of movement meant that he could have played on at a higher level even as his body began to hit the skids (as happens to many of us in our thirties).

The lure of Saudi Arabia was seemingly too much however, but Firmino was given a rousing send-off prior to his move to Al-Ahli – a trophy cabinet featuring the Premier League, Champions League, FA Cup and League Cup as good as it gets from the Brazilian’s time at Anfield.

Emre Can

It’s perhaps easy to downplay the Liverpool career of Emre Can, but a player signed for less than £10 million – that went on to make more than 100 appearances for the club – deserves recognition.

The German was almost a prisoner to his own versatility; his ability to play at full back, centre back and midfield seeing him unfairly cast as a jack of all trades, master of none.

But he served the club well, featuring in sides that lost in the finals of both the Champions League and Europa League, and was surprisingly released on a free transfer at the age of 24 in the summer of 2018.

Steven Gerrard

Yes, his best days were behind him when he left Liverpool in 2015, but there’s still something tragic about the fact that Steven Gerrard didn’t finish his playing career as a ‘one club man’.

He made more than 500 appearances for Liverpool, scored more than 100 goals, assisted dozens more and is every inch the club legend… there wasn’t a dry eye in the house when he left Anfield as a free agent to join LA Galaxy.

Gerrard retired 18 months after heading to Los Angeles, so why couldn’t he have hung up his boots at Liverpool and gotten the rapturous send-off his illustrious career so deserved?

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