Loyal, long-time Liverpool defender Jamie Carragher asks for the likes of the seemingly already-gone Xavi Alonso and Javier Mascherano to remain at the club or at least resolve their impending exits in a timely fashion. “When you have gone as close as we did last season,” said Carragher, “you don’t want to lose anyone from your squad. All I would say is that I don’t want any of our influential players to leave. I’m not naming names, but there have been stories that certain players could leave the club, and it’s important that those things are settled sooner rather than later. The last thing we want is to be going into the new season not knowing whether someone is going to leave before the transfer window closes. So the quicker these things are sorted the better, because then we can concentrate on the business of winning football matches.”