Liverpool manager Arne Slot remains under pressure. Results and performances are one thing, but sometimes he doesn’t help himself with his comments in the media.
At times, Slot’s words have felt almost as grating to supporters as the football itself. In fact, some of the frustration around Liverpool’s head coach has often felt self-inflicted.
Here are five particularly eyebrow-raising comments from this season that haven’t gone down especially well with Liverpool supporters.
5. A smack in the face
“The Forest defeat gave us a bit of a smack in the face,” Slot said of Liverpool’s disastrous 3-0 defeat at home to Nottingham Forest in November.
Out of context, there’s nothing wrong with this. It was a shocking result. But it was no outlier, no shock to the system.
They’d lost seven of their last 10 outings going into that match, including 3-0 defeats to Manchester City and Crystal Palace. There were also painful losses to Chelsea, Manchester United and Brentford.
Maybe we’re being picky, but it begs the question of what it was about Forest that felt like a smack in the face compared to the dismal results that preceded it.
On a similar theme, Slot has tried to put a positive spin on their recent unbeaten run.
But performances have been unconvincing and draws at home to all three newly-promoted clubs leave them completely out of the title picture and scrapping with Manchester United and Chelsea for Champions League qualification.
4. Low blocks
Where to start with this one?
We can’t pick out one quote from Slot on the difficulty of facing low blocks, because it’s been a running theme regular bugbear of his this season.
“Our reason why we’re inconsistent, if you want to call 13 times unbeaten inconsistent, and that has all to do with us struggling against low blocks,” the Liverpool manager said earlier this month.
To be fair, there has been a clear-eyed honesty in Slot’s analysis. Some have interpreted him moaning about the opposition, making a moral or aesthetic judgement over how they set up, but he rarely strays into that territory.
Slot’s analysis might well be bang on. But his diagnosis of the problem is wearing thin – fans would much rather he’d fix it.
Steven Gerrard, speaking as a pundit on TNT Sports during Liverpool’s recent 3-0 victory over Marseille, summed up the general mood within the fanbase.
“He needs to stop talking about low blocks,” the former captain said.
“Low blocks have been happening against Liverpool ever since I played, and many years before me. That’s just the way it is.
“Teams are going to do that, they’re going to try everything they can to try to stop Liverpool.
“The key is you have to find the solutions. With the players, you will then turn those ‘low-block games’ into wins rather than draws.
“But it’s not going to change. It’s what this team is going to face.”
3. PSG elimination
“Maybe the reason we won the league last season is because we played PSG and then had a week to prepare for league games,” Slot told reporters in a recent Champions League press conference.
Regardless of the fact that Liverpool have an expensive squad that has been built to go deep on numerous fronts, this comment just doesn’t stand up to scrutiny.
Liverpool boasted a 15-point lead over Arsenal when they were eliminated by PSG in March last season. They’d already effectively broken the back of the title charge and done the hard yards.
They did seal the title by winning four of their next five games in April, but there was a 3-2 defeat to Fulham and the League Cup final defeat to Newcastle.
There’s certainly an argument that their performance level dipped considerably after going out of Europe.
2. One title in 30 years
“Do people not expect that to be possible for me? To be successful?” Slot questioned during a particularly rocky patch.
“That’s new to me, but if you’re one-and-a-half years in the job and have already won the Premier League, when the club has won it twice in 30 years, I’m surprised to hear that. But if that is the situation, then I have to accept that.”
Managers have a right to defend themselves. Particularly if they delivered a league title in their first season at the helm.
But even if Slot is technically correct, doing Liverpool down is never going to go down well with the fans.
It reminds us of Thomas Frank constantly reminding us how Tottenham finished 17th last season – and look at his standing among the Spurs fans.
It’s also ignoring the context that he’s inherited a Liverpool squad that were consistently challenging for league titles, pipped by Manchester City’s juggernauts while registering 90+ point tallies. Going from that to dropping out of the top five is naturally going to bring scrutiny.
1. Atalanta
The worst one yet. One of those we’ve had to go and double-check we weren’t done by a blue-tick banter account.
“We are happy that we are going straight away to the last 16, especially because it’s only two years ago that we were playing Europa League and we went out in the quarter-finals against Atalanta,” Slot told reporters after securing another top-eight finish in the Champions League league phase.
“So, two seasons in a row now being in the last 16, and last season we were very hungry for more and we will definitely be hungry for more this season as well.”
Technically correct, again, but it totally misrepresents the picture of the Liverpool squad he inherited.
You could spin it another way and say they’d reached three Champions League finals in the last seven seasons.
Talking up Liverpool’s ambitions, stating they should be competing for the biggest trophies, is always going to go down better than a ‘little horse’ act that’s fooling nobody.
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