Liverpool defender Jamie Carragher reckons Arne Slot should have taken a leaf out of Jurgen Klopp’s book when it came to integrating his new players.
The Reds spent over £400m in the summer transfer window as they splashed out on a number of big signings, including Alexander Isak and Florian Wirtz.
Isak and Wirtz are not the only new signings who have struggled to cope at Liverpool with Milos Kerkez taking a lot of criticism over his performances.
Instead of easing Kerkez into his team, Slot made him his starting left-back immediately with Andy Robertson dropping to the bench early in the season.
And Carragher reckons Slot should have gradually introduced Kerkez into the side, like former Liverpool boss Klopp did with Robertson when the Scot signed.
Carragher told talkSPORT: “Looking at Liverpool in these last couple of weeks, there may be one valid criticism with hindsight would be about the manager.
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“Maybe he blooded too many of the signings too early, and it didn’t really help them as such.
“Maybe, even when you look back at what Jurgen Klopp did, especially with Andy Robertson initially, Andy Robertson didn’t actually play too much when he first signed, and he was sort of going to the Liverpool team around November, December.
“Maybe that would be the case with a few of the new signings as well, going forward.”
Liverpool have already conceded 18 goals in 11 Premier League games this term after they were beaten 3-0 by Manchester City on Sunday.
And Carragher reckons it’s down to Slot to get the defensive balance right in his side, he added: “I don’t think you necessarily need the best defenders in the world to be strong defensively as a team. I always think defence is about the team. It’s about a back four. It’s about working together.
“It’s not about individuals playing their own game. It’s about working off each other. You mentioned Andy Robertson’s relationship with Virgil van Dijk. They will know each other a lot better than young Kerkez will with van Dijk.
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“That’s just natural because he’s young into the team. I think the addition of Andy Robertson coming in, he definitely needed help last season, which probably wasn’t there.
“Now with Kerkez coming in, I would say the one mistake that maybe Arne Slot made is he almost treated Andy Robertson like he was the [Kostas] Tsimikas-type of role so far this season. I think the rotation should have been a little bit more at times with Andy Robertson.
“But now it looks like he’s got the shape. But eventually Kerkez will get that back. I don’t think it’s right that Andy Robertson plays every game because he found that tough, as he did at times last season.
“So yeah, it looks like there’s a better balance right around the team.”