Arne Slot ahead of the clash vs PSG.
Photo by Andrew Powell/Liverpool FC via Getty Images
Liverpool fans would be forgiven for feeling a touch of apprehension ahead of tonight’s Champions League second leg against Paris Saint-Germain, despite holding a 1-0 advantage from the first meeting.
The victory in Paris, while valuable on the scoreboard, came despite a performance that saw the Reds thoroughly outplayed for long stretches, managing just two shots compared to PSG’s staggering 27 attempts.
This weekend’s Premier League encounter with Southampton has done little to settle nerves around Anfield. Arne Slot’s men delivered another concerning first-half display, falling behind to Adam Armstrong’s opener and looking disjointed until Darwin Nunez’s equalizer just after the break.
Though Liverpool eventually secured a 3-1 victory thanks to second-half goals from Mohamed Salah, the sluggish start continued a worrying pattern of slow openings.
Against a PSG side desperate to overturn their deficit and bristling with attacking talent, Liverpool can ill afford another passive start. The French champions, who rested several key players at the weekend, will undoubtedly arrive at Anfield believing they can exploit any hesitancy in Liverpool’s play.
And in his programme notes, Arne Slot has addressed these concerts and asserted that the first half showing against Southampton ‘cannot’ happen tonight:
“The standards that we set ourselves are always high, which is why it is unacceptable when we fall below them,” Slot wrote in the match programme.:
“This happened in the first half of our game against Southampton on Saturday and we saw how difficult any game can be if we do not show the football characteristics that others expect of us, and we expect of ourselves. This cannot happen tonight.”
Slot then highlighted that the idea will be to play with a lot more energy levels than shown against the Saints, and the players should have no issues with adapting to this in front of a packed Anfield on a European night:
“The idea for tonight is that the energy levels we will play with will be much higher than they were in that first half,” Slot continued
“They will also be higher still than they were in the second half even though we produced a much better performance in that period. The intensity that PSG produced against us set a standard and we have to meet that challenge. This means stepping up a number of levels.”
The Reds received a boost with Cody Gakpo returning to fitness after missing recent matches with an ankle injury. However, the Reds remain without Tyler Morton, Conor Bradley, and Joe Gomez who are sidelined through injury.
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