footballtransfers.com

Did Salah get Slot sacked? The decisive moment that saw Liverpool pivot to Iraola

Updated: 30 May 2026 15:47 BST | 5 min read

Arne Slot, Mohamed Salah, Andoni Iraola, Liverpool

Tom Weber

Tom Weber | Writer

Multilingual sports writer who specialises in European football and American soccer.

Liverpool have sacked Arne Slot, with departing Bournemouth boss Andoni Iraola poised to replace the Dutchman.

The Reds pulled a complete about-face earlier on Saturday when they announced the sudden departure of head coach Slot following an end-of-season review. On the face of it, his sacking should not have been surprising.

After winning the Premier League in 2025 and breaking spending records last summer, Liverpool endured a disastrous 2025/26 season. Champions League qualification was only secured on the final day with a fifth-placed finish.

And yet, Slot was expected to stay beyond this summer. Liverpool had spent the past weeks briefing journalists that the Dutchman was not under any threat of getting fired and that the hierarchy fully backed him to turn things around next term.

Clearly, though, club chiefs were ultimately compelled to take off their rose-tinted glasses this week and face the bitter reality that Slot had shown himself incapable of arresting a form slump that had already begun in early 2025. He had also lost the fans in the process.

Liverpool settled on Iraola after Villa

Andoni Iraola, who is leaving Bournemouth after leading them to a club-record sixth-placed finish, is now the clear favourite to replace Slot, with Fabrizio Romano reporting that the Basque is ready to take the job.

Iraola had also been fielding interest from AC Milan, Bayer Leverkusen and Crystal Palace, but he made it clear that all this time he has been waiting for the Liverpool position to be vacated.

Andoni Iraola

This was a calculated risk. Iraola had an inkling that the Reds could make a change after they made contact with him earlier this month. Anfield Watch understands that Liverpool approached the 43-year-old in the wake of their dreadful 4-2 loss to Aston Villa on 15 May.

The timing of this is notable. While we don't know the exact moment Liverpool contacted Iraola, it is worth bearing in mind that Mohamed Salah dropped his now-infamous "heavy metal" football statement on 16 May.

The Egyptian, whose relationship with Slot was irreparably damaged in late 2025 after the coach dropped him to the bench, clearly took aim at the 47-year-old when he bemoaned that Liverpool had suffered yet another chastening loss.

Salah called for a return of the "heavy metal attacking" football of the Jurgen Klopp era and insisted that Champions League qualification was the "bare minimum" for a club like Liverpool. It was a thinly veiled dig at Slot.

"Us crumbling to yet another defeat this season was very painful and not what our fans deserve," Salah wrote. "I want to see Liverpool go back to being the heavy metal attacking team that opponents fear and back to being a team that wins trophies.

"That is the football I know how to play and that is the identity that needs to be recovered and kept for good. It cannot be negotiable and everyone that joins this club should adapt to it. Winning some games here and there is not what Liverpool should be about. All teams win games."

Mohamed Salah

Salah's post was liked by a raft of Liverpool players, which illustrated that it wasn't just the Egyptian who was unhappy with Slot. Because of his standing in the team and impending departure, Salah was the perfect individual to air the squad's grievances and to send a clear message to the club hierarchy. He had to fear no repercussions.

Florian Wirtz later tried to defuse the situation in an interview with The Athletic, but the optics were indisputable: the players had lost faith in Slot. This was also abundantly clear when the Reds' season ended with a whimper - a 1-1 home draw with Brentford.

Salah's post may not have been the catalyst for Liverpool's decision to make contact with Iraola, but it certainly contributed to a growing feeling that Slot's position had become untenable.

The fact that Iraola is now the heir-apparent to the Dutchman is unsurprising. Sporting director Richard Hughes appointed the Basque at Bournemouth in 2023 before making the switch to Liverpool.

Iraola also plays the kind of high-intensity, chaos-inducing, Klopp-esque football that Salah was calling for in his statement. Salah won't be part of the Iraola era at Anfield, but he has given Liverpool fans a parting gift by playing his part in the process that led to the 43-year-old's (expected) hire.