The inevitability of Liverpool and Arne Slot

18 defeats, a fading identity and questions over training ground work ethic leaves Arne Slot in a precarious position at Liverpool.

It took just three games into a new era at Liverpool for Arne Slot to capture people’s attentions, for the better, after Liverpool made it three wins from three in the league and dismantled Erik ten Hag’s Manchester United 3-0.

Despite United’s struggles, it was still mightily impressive for a new Liverpool manager to go into Old Trafford and win so convincingly. Within that performance, Ryan Gravenberch was in the early trials of a total renewal at the club, having been overlooked a bit under Jurgen Klopp. Luis Diaz was firing. Salah looked fresh. There were so many things going for the team and their new manager.

And then Slot swanned over to the Sky Sports sideline desk and delivered a most clinical and damning tactical analysis of the opposition team. On the surface, it was nothing groundbreaking — a succinct summation of what he and his team had analysed before the game and duly taken advantage of.

"Their full-backs are sometimes really high and then Casemiro comes in between. So if you pick the ball and you keep Luis Diaz and Mo Salah high you're constantly in a one-v-one situation."

It was straight-talking and something rarely sounded from a Premier League manager. As Ten Hag’s future wobbled, it was a fellow Dutch manager who was sticking the knife in in front of a worldwide audience — here’s what we saw, and here’s how we managed to beat these guys so easily.

This past weekend, in Slot’s long-awaited second trip over to Old Trafford, the tone around his management has changed drastically, while on the field Liverpool look a shambles. Where Gravenberch and MacAllister had dominated the midfield 20 months prior, they were mere shadows to 34-year-old Casemiro and once-alienated Kobbie Mainoo. Gravenberch looks a shell of his Team of the Year form of last season, while MacAllister has fallen off so severely that he almost gets a reprieve in being left on the sideline.

Trent Alexander-Arnold offering from full back is obviously long gone, whilst Luis Diaz — who scored and created havoc all game back in August of 2024 — is preparing for a Champions League semi-final second leg with Bayern Munich, a week off the back of one of the great European goals.

And rather than Ten Hag facing his backside to the fire, Slot seems the one now in danger of losing his position. All the indications from the club are that they will stick with Slot, but when United went 2-0 up inside the first fifteen minutes at Old Trafford there was an air that a big defeat will make Slot’s position totally untenable. Thanks largely in part to United errors, Liverpool clawed it back to 2-2 and Slot’s job suddenly looked secure again. A 3-2 defeat, ultimately, was kind on Liverpool, who looked like a part-time cast of struggling footballers.

So much has been documented about Liverpool downfall since this time last year. Arne Slot, an unlikely but convincing first-time Premier League winning manager, was already starting to see the cracks. A poor Champions League bowing out against PSG and a slight post-title sealing drop in form eventually led to a summer of total tragedy and transfer market chaos.

A year on, his time at Liverpool hangs by a thread. It seems crazy that Liverpool would so quickly sour on a league winning manager but there’s now a dark cloud of inevitability around Slot’s future. Fans have lost faith, while the club leadership push as much pro-Slot coverage that any one media platform can handle. Slot perseveres somehow, but his terse and self-assured manner has been replaced by daily firefighting and unsatisfying soundbites.

He continues to back himself and the FSG-powered leadership seem happy to do the same, while fans wonder if he’s lost that initial bottle and steeliness that makes a them row behind a manager. Klopp was a force of nature, personality-wise, that made fans and players alike want to run through walls on his behalf, and even when times were bad there was never a semblance of doubt that he wasn’t the man to turn things around.

As of now, it’s hard to see such a capability from Slot. Losing has become the norm, an astonishing 18 in all competitions this season, with an utterly withered team that lacks fight and energy and any semblance of an identity.

They’re in a tremendously lucky position that the league around them has been equally lethargic, somehow allowing them to slot into a Champions League position for next season, something FSG will no doubt be delighted by as it once again props up the coffers for more badly needed spending.

The club clearly believe that there’s several unavoidable issues that Slot has had to contend with that, rather than completely writing off the season, have at least hindered him enough to give him a bit of a once-off reprieve. But that free hit has become so desperately bad on and off the field that it’s become increasingly risky to let that seep into another season.

Liverpool spent a warchest last season, dragging the Alexander Isak saga deep into the summer, denying him a true pre-season. Florian Wirtz and Hugo Ekitike have had flashes of brilliance but it’s been far too fleeting, while the German has been anonymous for large swathes of games, including this past weekend.

Accelerating matters and derailing the settling of new players has been the downturn of old players. Mo Salah signed a massive two-year extension to continue his career at Liverpool but has clashed with Slot and his own form has fallen off a cliff, so much so that the club and the club legend have mututally agreed to part ways. Virgil van Dijk has been shaky, but is also almost singlehandedly trying to keep a pondering midfield and a shaky defence from combusting. MacAllister form has been stark, something dating back to the end of last season, while Slot has trust issues over his wider squad, forcing him to persist with a team of out of form players.

The most damning messaging out of the club, and not so thinly-veiledly stoked by the leaving Mo Salah, has been the drop in training ground work ethic and intensity. Liverpool look completely zapped of energy, but are reportedly barely training and are often taking days off to recover. If this is Slot easing off on the accelerator ahead of slamming the metal to the floor next season, he risks finding a squad that have forgotten how to put in the hard yards and have lost its hardened edge forged under Klopp.

But it looks like, for now, Slot’s position is safe. He has the backing of his bosses and a limitation of alternatives on the market, which currently start and end with former player Xabi Alonso, who although a fanciful thought for fans has his own question marks.

With a summer curtailed by the World Cup, a squad still needing an awful lot of surgery, and a further purging of senior leadership, it all leaves Liverpool and Slot in a very precarious position. New players will need to flip their form instantly. Florian Wirtz will need to start justifying his huge outlay. New player leadership will need to set vastly higher standards in a post-Salah dressing room. And vitally, for Arne Slot, Liverpool need to find an identity and stop losing games.