Carvajal's battle with Alexander-Arnold could spur Madrid to glory

Dani Carvajal's quest to become the greatest footballer in the 61-year history of the European Cup and UEFA Champions League begins this week.

Not Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Xavi Hernández, Andrés Iniesta, Clarence Seedorf, Alfredo Di Stéfano, Karim Benzema, Johan Cruyff, Gerd Müller, Sergio Ramos or Paolo Maldini.

No, Dani Carvajal; the locally born kid with the warrior nature, a cop father and the youth team "Mirlo" -- the nickname given to promising Real Madrid youth prospects -- who Florentino Pérez chose to lay the first brick of Madrid's Valdebebas Sports City (Training Complex) 21 years ago.

Carvajal is already tied with two of Los Blancos' finest-ever players -- Galician winger Paco Gento and Luka Modric -- as the only men ever to lift this famous, iconic trophy six times.

However, only Gento (1956-1966) and Carvajal (2014-2024) have been named in the starting XI in six European Cup/Champions League finals. Already monstrous achievements.

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The last time Carvajal won the Champions League, he scored against Borussia Dortmund in the Wembley final, was man of the match, and told me: "To win my sixth Champions League is unimaginable. To enter this select group is unique.

"Since I was a young kid, I've always played using all my strength and my friends always told me: 'Calm down, this isn't a Champions League match!'

"This represents the feeling of winning this trophy. There's nothing more important you can win while playing with your club."

You can taste the exuberance, the desire to do it again, right?

If Carvajal, now steered by ex-Madrid and Spain teammate Xabi Alonso, can lift the "Cup With The Big Ears" in Budapest on May 30 next year, then Dani Boy will be out on his own.

First amongst equals right now; eight months and 15 matches away from being alone on top of the all-time pantheon.

The quest (bench or in the first XI because a certain double-barreled Liverpudlian wants to fight for the right-back berth) begins on Tuesday against Marseille at the Santiago Bernabéu.

If not the perfect "poetic" rival, then close.

Carvajal was born halfway through the last-ever European Cup season (1991-92). The first winners of the new Champions League, controversially to say the least given their conviction for domestic match-rigging, were the self-same Marseille.

In that same year of his birth, Real Madrid weren't even in this competition (they only played UEFA Cup or Cup Winner's Cup football between 1991 and 1995 ... and no European football at all in 1996-97!)

When young Carvajal was born, Los Blancos had six European Cup wins. They were 26 years on since the last final victory, and were still six seasons away from their next. Yet from that day to this, Madrid have won the competition an astonishing nine further times, with Carvajal starting right-back in six of those winning finals. Remarkable.

This season, for the first time in an age, the 33-year-old has proper competition from within the ranks. Or, at least, he should have.

By comparison, Trent Alexander-Arnold has played in three Champions League finals over the last seven years, winning one, in Madrid vs. Tottenham Hotspur, and losing two, against his current employers.

I'd guess Alexander-Arnold sparked Madrid's unquenchable determination to have him on their books that magical night, six years ago, when his impish, imaginative chutzpah put Barcelona out of the Champions League semifinal at Anfield.

You remember, right? 3-0 down from the Camp Nou against Messi & Co., Liverpool absolutely stomped all over Ernesto Valverde's Barça and, with 11 minutes left in the second-leg, led 3-0.

Street-smart Alexander-Arnold, walking away from a corner kick, spotted Barcelona were sound asleep, that their marking was infantile and, instinctively, hopped back three steps and smacked the ball from the corner flag straight onto the toes of Divock Origi who bundled home the winner.

Liverpool through, Barcelona humiliated ... and whether he'd admit it or not now, Carvajal would have been bouncing off the ceiling in delight and singing "You'll Never Walk Alone" until his voice went raw.

As for Madrid supremo Pérez? "That boy will do for us -- persuade him, sign him -- MUST HAVE!" will certainly have been the note to the president's transfer market operatives.

Despite all of that -- despite Madrid forking out €10 million to get "Trent" as he's universally known in a country where pronouncing Alexander-Arnold doesn't come easy, when they could have waited four weeks and secured him for free, and arriving with Carvajal still fighting off the worst injury of his life -- it's been far from plain sailing for the England international. Disconcerting you might say.

In nine appearances Alexander-Arnold's played the full 90 minutes just twice. A sub in two of the last three LaLiga matches and, when Madrid were down to 10 men at Real Sociedad on Saturday, with 33-year-old Carvajal still nominally working his way back to full fitness and low risk after his brutal knee injury, Alexander-Arnold was only given eight minutes. Against that he's produced two goal assists and played notably well in Madrid's Liga win over Mallorca.

The incumbent will fight like a tiger, not just to win the Champions League-Liga-Copa treble which too easily eluded them last season, but to be Alonso's first-choice. But Carvajal will definitely keep the competition healthy -- he's a Madridista first and foremost -- easily the most dyed-in-the-wool Los Blancos supporter in the squad.

Thus: everything given to keep Trent out of the team, then everything given to support him when the Englishman is in the XI.

Carvajal told El Larguero: "Trent's a great lad who's fitted in well. I have to be 100% on my game because we're competing for the same place.

"But I always hit best form when I have tough competition. Trent and I have different qualities. Choosing which of us gets to play, which game, which moment, must be tricky. But a nice problem for the coach.

"I've had years of the demanding life at Madrid. I'm certainly not gonna raise the white flag first time I'm subbed for him or he starts! When you don't play it's tough -- the medicine is to arrive first at training, give extra, be the best every morning and then when you come off ... know you've given everything.

"When you have a positional rival you think: 'I gotta be better than him because I want his position.'

"It happens in every club, every position. If people react correctly then the team's level goes up. By the end of the season we'll see who's had more playing time."

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It's ironic that the 26-year-old Liverpudlian is at Madrid partly influenced by what he learned at their hands. Those two Champions League final defeats to Madrid hurt, but inspired too.

The last time I interviewed Alexander-Arnold he told me: "Especially in finals, it's not about performances.

"You either win or you lose. No one talks about whether you played well or you deserved it."

That could easily be Carvajal's mantra for his entire career. Play well if you can, but don't lose. Win, whatever it takes.

On the Kyiv final of 2018 Alexander-Arnold said: "We took lessons from that Madrid game, we'd seen how they went about winning, they knew how to.

"We couldn't get the ball off them; Luka Modrić, Toni Kroos and Isco were just toying with us. They were almost mocking us -- they knew exactly what it took to win."

And so, as his Holy Grail quest begins, Carvajal is sanguine about playing time and the tussle with Trent: "The coach wants to keep at least 17 players on rotation so that we're all fresh.

"We all need to understand that bringing someone on for the last 30 minutes, bringing fresh legs into the game, can be crucial.

"That sub could turn the whole game around in that last half hour so it's vital he's not sitting moping on the bench because he didn't start. It's really important that nobody begins to believe he's indispensable."

Let Madrid's competition for places, and the battle for the Champions League, commence!