2<\/p>\n Thiago signed off his playing career at AnfieldCredit: Getty<\/p>\n Thiago hung up his boots after his Liverpool<\/a> contract expired at the end of the 2023\/24 season, but he was back working within months.<\/p>\n The 35-year-old initially returned to his boyhood club, Barcelona, as part of Flick\u2019s team shortly after the German\u2019s arrival at Camp Nou.<\/p>\n His first coaching stint lasted just a month, but Thiago then returned to the Catalonians\u2019 set-up last September until the end of last season.<\/p>\n The former midfielder sparked links to another of his old clubs, Liverpool, when his fellow Spaniard Iraola took the reins in June.<\/p>\n read more liverpool news<\/p>\n According to the Telegraph, Thiago is \u201csaid to be keen\u201d on a role on Merseyside, but the man himself has admitted it can\u2019t happen yet.<\/p>\n Thiago can’t join Liverpool as coach<\/p>\n During an interview with Rio Ferdinand on the latter\u2019s YouTube channel, the 46-cap Spanish international explained that he does not have the required qualifications as yet to take up a post at Anfield.<\/p>\n Ferdinand asked directly: \u201cWhen the Liverpool job came up, were you interested or not?\u201d<\/p>\n Thiago simply replied: \u201cNo man, I don\u2019t have the badges. I don\u2019t have enough to be a coach.\u201d<\/p>\n While Ferdinand may have been referring to the top job at Liverpool, a UEFA Pro License or UEFA A License is needed to secure any permanent senior backroom role in the UK.<\/p>\n 2<\/p>\n Liverpool have made new signings and have a new head coach in Andoni Iraola this summerCredit: Getty<\/p>\n Work permit issues have been encountered at Liverpool in the past when coaches haven\u2019t obtained the necessary qualifications.<\/p>\n Ex-Reds boss Arne Slot wanted to bring Etienne Reijnen, an assistant coach who specialised in set-pieces, from Feyenoord<\/a> in 2024.<\/p>\n The 39-year-old was denied a work permit but looked to arrive at Anfield this summer, only for Liverpool to part company with Slot<\/a>.<\/p>\n Sipke Hulshoff, Giovanni van Bronckhorst<\/a> and Ruben Peeters all followed the Dutchman out of the Reds exit door<\/a> last month.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Iraola has succeeded in bringing Tommy Elphick from Bournemouth to Liverpool<\/a> as a first-team coach this week.<\/p>\n As talkSPORT reported at the start of June, Iraola intended to\u00a0bring his Cherries coaching staff<\/a>\u00a0with him to Merseyside, which included Elphick, who was also approached by Bristol City<\/a>.<\/p>\n World Cup WhatsApp<\/p>\n Don’t miss an update from talkSPORT in our dedicated World Cup WhatsApp channel.<\/p>\n Search for ‘talkSPORT World Cup’ in your ‘Updates’ tab on WhatsApp and we\u2019ll drop the proper, unfiltered football chat straight to your lock screen\u2014no fluff, just pure talkSPORT energy.<\/p>\n It’s where you’ll find out all the new rules to watch out for, England and Scotland reaction and big match player ratings. <\/p>\n Plus there will be loads of debates on the biggest talking points as Haaland, Mbappe, Kane and the biggest names in football descend on America, Canada and Mexico.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Thiago Alcantara has poured cold water on reports linking him with a return to Liverpool as part of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":674579,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[137252,218,1767,218525,101,57026,225567,225568,110,568,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-674578","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-andoni-iraola","tag-football","tag-liverpool-transfer-news","tag-liverpool-transfers","tag-sports","tag-thiago-alcantara","tag-thiago-alcantara-liverpool","tag-thiago-alcantara-liverpool-return","tag-transfer-news","tag-transfers","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/674578","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=674578"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/674578\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/674579"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=674578"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=674578"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=674578"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Thiago](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/sun-sun-sunday-thiago-alcantara-902959357.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n![\"Andoni](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/sun-sun-sunday-andoni-iraola-1086017984.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n