Liverpool captain Jordan Henderson says the club must consider giving full-back Jon Flanagan a contract extension.
Flanagan's current deal expires this summer, but there have yet to be talks about retaining the 23-year-old before he becomes a free agent.
But Henderson said keeping England international Flanagan, who is newly returning after missing 18 months with a knee injury, will be crucial for Liverpool's future.
"It's huge that it gets sorted out," Henderson told the Liverpool Echo. "I don't think players and people like Flanno grow on trees to be honest.
"You have people like him and Stevie [Gerrard] and [Jamie Carragher] who have come through the academy. The fans feel as though they are one of them really which they are.
"His whole family supports Liverpool. He has been a Liverpool supporter since he was a kid and he has had a difficult time for the last two years, but what I have seen him do behind the scenes is incredible really.
"He is a huge player for us, a huge player for the club and the fans as well. It is in everyone's interests for that to be sorted out soon."
Henderson said he has respect for the way Flanagan fought to return after a pair of operations on his knee.
"I've seen how hard he has been working and the attitude he has had with the injury," Henderson said. "I was only out for three or four months but that felt long for me and it was difficult for me to handle because I had never experienced that length of time out.
"But for the injury he had and how long he was out, it was incredible the way he went about it.
"Every day in here he came in with a smile on his face, did his work and for me you need to be rewarding people like that for what he done.
"Now he's back and the games he has played it is as if he has never been away. He has been brilliant and in training he's exactly the same."