Liverpool
Twelve months ago, Liverpool were at the very top of the English game. They’d just secured their twentieth Premier League title, and Arne Slot had pulled off one of the most incredible debut seasons a manager could ever hope for. The following summer was supposed to be the start of an era of dominance, fueled by a record-breaking transfer spend and massive expectations. Instead, the 2025/26 campaign has felt like a slow-motion car crash, a fifth-place finish, early exits from the FA Cup and Champions League, and a winless streak at Anfield that hasn’t been seen in 70 years. Three main factors explain why things fell apart so completely.
Three Reasons Behind Liverpool’s Poor 2025/26 Season:
1. A Squad That Never Clicked
Liverpool went into the season after a massive £416 million summer spending spree, over £100 million more than Chelsea, the next highest spenders. On paper, the new arrivals looked like game-changers. In reality, they just didn’t fit together. Florian Wirtz signed from Bayer Leverkusen for £100 million, but the supposed “dream” front three of Wirtz, Ekitike, and Isak only actually played together for 117 minutes all season.
Constant injuries killed any chance of building rhythm, and the tactical setups Slot worked on in training just didn’t translate to matchdays. None of the big signings really lived up to the hype, leaving a disjointed defence exposed in situations that a settled team would have dealt with easily.
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2. The Death of the Press
Technical issues aside, Liverpool’s tactical backbone basically vanished. Their famous high press turned messy and disorganised. Last year, the midfield and defence squeezed the play instantly, forcing mistakes and suffocating opponents. This season, that coordination was gone; the forwards and midfielders were often on different pages, sometimes failing to press altogether.
This gave opponents way too much time on the ball in the middle of the pitch to pick their passes and build attacks. A soft underbelly emerged, with basic individual mistakes becoming the norm and the system looking more broken every week. That loss of structure left them wide open in moments they used to control.
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3. Tragedy, Fatigue, and the Emotional Toll
The final factor has nothing to do with tactics or money. On 3 July 2025, the club were devastated by the death of Diogo Jota in a car accident. Retiring his number 20 shirt was a powerful gesture, but the loss left a mark far deeper than any tactical failure. You can’t leave that kind of grief at the dressing room door, and trying to compete at the highest level while mourning, all while dealing with a brutal fixture list, was clearly a massive burden on the players.
The team struggled with emotional exhaustion and the physical toll of so many games, even with Slot rotating the squad more than usual. As Slot admitted in April, this transition was inevitable; the title win probably just masked the fact that an era was ending.
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Liverpool still have the pieces to put things right. Youngsters like Rio Ngumoha have been a real bright spot in a tough year, and the club’s leadership is still solid. The big question for 2026/27 is whether Slot will be given the time he needs to actually rebuild.