Alexis Mac Allister next: The last World Cup winners Liverpool signed – & how they fared | OneFootball

Alexis Mac Allister has become just the third World Cup winner to sign for Liverpool.

The likes of Roger Hunt and Fernando Torres won the most prestigious prize in football while representing the Reds, while Xabi Alonso did so after departing Anfield, but Mac Allister is only the third player to sign for Liverpool having already lifted the Jules Rimet trophy.

The 24-year-old midfielder played an important role as Argentina proved triumphant in the mid-season World Cup in Qatar. He kept up that exceptional form for Brighton in the latter half of the 2022-23 campaign, helping Roberto De Zerbi’s Seagulls qualify for Europe before sealing a £35million transfer to Anfield.

“It feels amazing. It’s a dream come true, it’s amazing to be here and I can’t wait to get started,” Mac Allister told Liverpool’s official website after the deal was announced.

“I wanted to be in [from] the first day of pre-season, so it’s good that everything is done. I’m looking forward to meeting my teammates.

“It was a fantastic year for me – World Cup, what we achieved with Brighton – but now it’s time to think about Liverpool and try to be a better player and a better human being every day.”

But how did Liverpool’s last two World Cup-winning signings fare? We’ve taken a closer look.

Karl-Heinz Riedle

The forward received 46 caps for Germany, but he was an unused substitute as Franz Beckenbauer opted for a front two of Jürgen Klinsmann and Rudi Voller in the 1990 World Cup final victory over Diego Maradona’s Argentina.

But Riedle had played his part in Die Mannschaft getting to the final and clocked up over an hour on the pitch as they made it past England in the semi-finals of Italia ’90.

His club career saw him with the Bundesliga with both Werder Bremen and Borussia Dortmund, with whom he also won the Champions League in 1996-97. He then joined Liverpool, where he had his moments but only featured on the periphery as the considerably younger Michael Owen broke through from the academy and began to establish himself as a world-beater.

Riedle moved to Fulham in 1999 and briefly served as caretaker manager alongside his former Reds boss Roy Evans and capped off his career with promotion back to the Premier League in 2000-01.

Bernard Diomede

Diomede made three appearances for France as they won their first World Cup on home soil in 1998, although he didn’t make it onto the pitch for Les Bleus in the quarter, semi or final.

By that point he’d established himself as a more than capable winger for boyhood club Auxerre, having played a starring role in their league and cup double in 1995-96. He missed out on France’s squad for Euro 2000 but moved to Liverpool for £3million that summer, signed by compatriot Gerard Houllier.

Liverpool famously won three trophies in the 2000-01 season, but Diomede struggled with injuries and made next to no impact at the club. He made just five appearances for the club and scored no goals, eventually moving to Ajaccio with a loan deal made permanent in 2003.

“He’s been very unlucky,” said Houllier at the time. “I brought him here to give us some width, but then he got injured and, by the time he’d got himself back to fitness, the team had moved on.”