Liverpool star Dominik Szoboszlai determined to realise childhood dream with Reds

Dominik Szoboszlai has achieved goals he set out as a child by playing for his country but is determined to now conquer Europe with Liverpool and also has the Premier League in his sights

Dominik Szoboszlai wants to win the Champions League and Premier League with Liverpool.

Szoboszlai has made a career out of realising his childhood dreams and he grew up wanting to play in the Champions League and then score in Europe’s top club competition.

Szoboszlai dreamed of playing for Hungary and captaining his country, which he will do tomorrow when he leads them out against The Netherlands in the Nations League. He has plenty of goals left and he wants to lift the Champions League and Premier League with Liverpool.

“I want to win the Champions League,” he said. “When I was a kid, I wanted to hear the anthem on the field, then I wanted to score. Then I wanted to be a national-team player, then I wanted to be captain. I did all of that.

“Now, as I’m playing in the Premier League, of course I want to win the Premier League with Liverpool. And I want to win the Champions League as well. So, I have big goals, but I set goals for myself that are realistic.”

Szoboszlai, 23, oozes confidence at Liverpool and is one of their first-team regulars under head coach Arne Slot. He was not always this way and remembers how hard it was for him to leave his home in Hungary to play for Red Bull Salzburg’s second team FC Liefering as a teenager.

“It’s not only the stuff you’re doing on the field, the hardest thing is mentally,” he said. “The hardest thing is to leave your parents and your friends when you were 14. To live alone, to be there in another country without knowing the language. That’s the hardest part.

“And also, of course, next to it, the training, because you’re not the only one who wants to become a Liverpool player, all of them wanted to become a Liverpool player. But that’s step by step, so you have to get to the first team and then you have to go to another league and if you do all that well, you can come to Liverpool.”

Szoboszlai joined Liverpool in June 2023 for £60million from RB Leipzig and he says the hard work has not stopped.

“It’s not like you have a fixed place in the team,” he said. “You have to work to get into the team, to get your minutes, to play well, to score goals. It’s a long journey.”

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