'Nobody asks players what they think about adding games'

Liverpool's Brazilian goalkeeper Alisson Becker is excited to play in the Champions League as the club returns to the competition after a season's absence.

AC Mian welcome Liverpool for the first group match at the San Siro on Tuesday.

"Imagine something you really like to do and then you don't do it for a year, how much you'd be looking forward to doing it again. That's the way we feel," Alisson, who helped Liverpool win the tournament in 2019, said.

"Playing in the Champions League is one of the reasons I came to Europe from Brazil. Not playing in it last season was really hard.

"But here we are again, qualifying from a really difficult league in the Premier League."

Alisson however expressed a grievance on the new Champions League format.

The new Champions League format this season will see more teams playing more games for more prize money.

The 2024-25 Champions League is the first to be run under the “Swiss system”, in which each team play eight matches in a group phase that will not finish until late January.

Alisson has criticised the expansion of the competition, claiming that players had not been consulted on adding two extra games to the group phase and that “maybe our opinion doesn’t matter”.

“I think for the supporters it’s amazing,” Alisson said.

“More games, bigger games, big teams playing against each other. For us as players, it’s always a good idea to add some games to a calendar that is not busy. I am being ironic a little bit.

“Nobody asks the players what they think about adding more games, so maybe our opinion doesn’t matter. But everyone knows what we think about having more games. Everybody is tired of that. But we have to stay focused on the big challenge that we have tomorrow.”