Gary Lineker agrees with Jurgen Klopp on Gabriel Martinelli who shines for Arsenal in Premier League defeat to Liverpool but Piers Morgan hopes he keeps his hands off

Arsenal were beaten, but there was a positive in the shape of Gabriel Martinelli.

The young forward proved a handful for Liverpool’s defence at times in the Reds’ 2-0 Premier League win on Wednesday night.

And former England striker Gary Lineker was left impressed, tweeting: “Martinelli will be a world class player.”

It echoes the view of Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp who has previously been complimentary about the 20-year-old. When he faced him for the first, in a thrilling 5-5 Carabao Cup draw in 2019, he described him as the ‘talent of the century’.

Klopp then praised him again on Wednesday when highlighting the solid display of Trent Alexander-Arnold in defending the diagonal balls to the young Brazilian.

“Martinelli is such a talented boy. It’s really tricky, if anybody says Trent can’t defend, they should come to me I’ll knock them down,” he said.

Second-half goals from Diogo Jota and Roberto Firmino were enough to secure victory for Liverpool at the Emirates as they took full advantage of City’s goalless draw away to Crystal Palace 48 hours earlier.

Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta was left disappointed by the result, insisting it didn’t reflect the performance.

“From box-to-box I think in many moments we were the better team and we did everything we planned,” he said.

For Martinelli, though, fans must be hoping Klopp’s kind words – he has also previously labelled him ‘outstanding’ – is not a ploy to lure him north.

“On a solitary positive note, Gabriel Martinelli was brilliant,” famous Gooner Piers Morgan said. “Just hope he wasn’t so brilliant that Klopp nicks him.”