This is a meandering story so bear with me, I am selling my beloved 2005 Skoda (my drive to work car before I retired) today on Ebay, when I take it to the village garage for the MOT they always put protective seat covers on so their overalls don't get dirty!
About four years ago it was struggling to start on cold mornings (old battery) and the charge light started to glow a little, I bought a new battery from Tanya batteries and a s/h alternator from Ebay, Before either arrived the problem went away and both alternator and battery sat uncared for at the back of the garage for at least two years. Eventually the battery did fail, I put that neglected battery on, gave it a quick charge and it's still good, it didn't appear to suffer from being discharged for months. By coincidence a couple of weeks later the pulley sheared off the alternator, luckily I had a spare in stock.
If you have ever wonder how far you can travel if the alternator drive belt fails in your TF then the answer is 33 miles, A few months ago the belt on ours started to squeal on a drive, we turned round and started to head for home, the alternator light came on just as it was getting dark and a quick inspection showed that the belt had disintegrated. I decided to carry on until we ground to a halt, after 33 miles we got to where I keep it, the lights had been fading for the last couple of miles though. After parking it I tried restarting but there wasn't enough power left for more than a couple of clicks from the starter motor.