Ex-Liverpool star Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain training at former club

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Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain is currently training with Arsenal after being released by Besiktas over the summer.

The midfielder moved to Turkey on a free transfer following the expiry of his Liverpool contract in 2023, but Besiktas terminated his contract in August, nine months before it was due to expire in June 2026. The 32-year-old has been without a club since his release, but is maintaining his fitness at former club Arsenal - a club he spent six years at between 2011 and 2017.

Oxlade-Chamberlain left Arsenal to join Liverpool but was plagued by injuries during his spell at Anfield, averaging fewer than 25 appearances per season across his six years with the club.

Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta was a teammate of Oxlade-Chamberlain for five years, with the pair winning the FA Cup together in 2014 and 2015.

Media cameras were allowed into Arsenal's training base on Monday ahead of the Gunners' Champions League meeting with Slavia Prague this week.

The cameras captured Oxlade-Chamberlain taking part in a training drill with Arsenal's academy places while Arteta's first-team squad were put through their paces a few yards away.

Oxlade-Chamberlain has reportedly had several offers from around Europe to resume his career, but would prefer to find a new club in England.

The midfielder made a brilliant start to his Liverpool career during the 2017-18 season, but a serious knee injury sustained in a Champions League game against Roma sidelined him for more than a year, and he never regained the dynamism that made him such a key player for Jurgen Klopp's high-intensity team.

When Oxlade-Chamberlain left Liverpool in 2023, Klopp reflected on how important a player he was to the team in the months after he made the move to Merseyside from North London.

“Ox is a super guy, an absolutely super guy," Klopp said.

"Now with Ox it’s a bigger shame, how it sometimes is with players – he had here super times and now in the end I’m pretty sure he is not 100 per cent happy and I can understand that, definitely.

“But the one moment that comes in my mind, it describes a little bit the time here but as well how good he is, is the situation in the Roma semi-final, the home game when he got injured.

"In that moment, I had no idea how to replace him, honestly – Ox was that good.

“It was everything: he came here, had played from time to time at wing-back at Arsenal, winger for sure, and he became a proper No.8 here in the way we wanted to play – super-energetic, technically outstanding."

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