In the tenth instalment of Metro’s In The Mixer, we’re looking at where Liverpool have been going wrong this season, and how Arne Slot can fix the problems they are having. Sign up to receive this, plus more exclusive analysis, insights and transfer talk straight to your inbox every week.
Spare a thought for Liverpool fans. The Reds’ poor start to the season has left them in second place in the Premier League, and with the side coming off the back of three defeats in a row Slot is coming under real pressure for the first time since taking over at Anfield.
Fans of other sides are likely looking at Liverpool with jealousy considering how little needs to go wrong for them to start worrying.
At this point it’s still likely Slot’s side challenge for the Premier League and go a fair distance in the Champions League – they are good enough to have success in the domestic cups too.
But things do feel a bit off on Merseyside.
When Slot first joined the club, the general consensus was that they would take a while to adapt to life without Jurgen Klopp and could fall foul to a post-Fergie/Wenger style slump.
Instead, he cleverly managed to combine Klopp’s heavy-metal football with a more considered approach – it was evolution rather than revolution.
But just two months into a season with raised expectations, Liverpool are faltering and disjointed.
Slot has been widely praised for his decision-making but can’t seem to get team selection right, new players are taking time to bed in and the stars of last season are struggling to replicate their performances.
Liverpool are a team in transition, so what can Slot do to grease the wheels?
Get the ball to Mohamed Salah
Yes, Florian Wirtz and Alexander Isak are the future of this Liverpool attack and yes, Hugo Ekitike is the team’s in-form striker, but to succeed this season Slot needs to find a way to get Mo Salah involved more often.
The Egyptian had his best season in a Liverpool shirt last year, with 29 goals and 18 assists in the league.
Part of that success was down to Slot adapting the team to best suit Salah’s strengths.
‘As long as you rest me defensively, I will provide offensively,’ Salah told his manager last season, who removed most of the attacker’s defensive responsibilities. ‘Try to rest me as much as I could and I will show you the numbers’.
Salah was the focal point of the attack last year and averaged over 10 touches in the opposition box per game.
That has dropped by about 50% to just over 5 touches per game this season.
The arrival of Florian Wirtz has meant the team’s shape has changed. Where before Salah had Dominik Szoboszlai – who worked well as a facilitator – next to him, Wirtz has come into the team in the number 10 spot and changed the dynamic.
Wirtz is like Salah in that he craves touches of the ball and likes to be at the centre of the play.
Slot is stuck between trying to integrate Wirtz as the future star of the team and continuing to play to Salah’s strengths as the current star, and as a result is doing neither.
By getting the ball to Salah more often and getting Wirtz closer to the Egyptian to link up play, Liverpool can get the best out of both.
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Figure out what the fullbacks are meant to be doing
It’s not that easy, though. Part of the reason Salah has been so isolated this season is the loss of Trent Alexander-Arnold.
The impact his departure has had on the team has gone under the radar slightly, with his ability to find teammates with forward passes a huge loss to the defence.
Alexander-Arnold and Salah had a great understanding on the pitch which was nurtured over a number of years.
The former Liverpool hero’s range of passing got the team out of trouble on a number of occasions and Salah could take risks with his forward runs knowing that his teammate would find him.
Alexander-Arnold played 8.8 progressive passes per 90 minutes last season – this year Conor Bradley is averaging 4.6 and Jeremie Frimpong 3.3.
What’s a progressive pass?
Progressive passes are passes that go towards the opposition team’s goal – but it’s a bit more complicated than that.
To qualify as a progressive pass, the ball must travel at least 10 yards closer to the opponent’s goal than any point in the previous six passes, or a successful pass that lands in the opponent’s penalty area.
In simpler terms: passes that get the ball at least 10 yards closer to the other team’s goal.
On the other side, Liverpool bought Milos Kerkez off the back of a stunning year full of lung-bursting runs and whipped crosses that got fans excited, but Slot has asked him to play much deeper and narrower.
Fullback has become one of the most important positions on the pitch, especially for getting around the opposition press and finding space in between the lines.
This season, Slot doesn’t seem to know what he wants them to do.
Pick your best team and rotate less
Part of Liverpool’s success last season came from having a very clear first-choice XI, with some small changes depending on the opposition.
Predicting a Slot side was easy and their early season form in 2024 was helped by the fact the players knew exactly what the plan was on a game-by-game basis.
However, the lack of rotation meant that by the time Liverpool faced PSG in the Champions League in March, players looked leggy and suffered from fatigue.
So it makes sense that Slot is trying to fix that problem this year by rotating his side more often in the hope they can go the distance in multiple competitions.
But the combination of the number of new players and changing lineups have contributed to their up and down form this year.
Slot has tried Wirtz as a floating number 10 and out on the left. Szoboszlai has played behind the striker, in midfield and at fullback, while Ekitike and Isak are both players who like to drift towards the left, where Cody Gakpo likes to be.
Add in the recent injuries to Alisson and Konate and it looks like Slot will be chopping and changing again for this weekend’s game against Manchester United.
A win and, maybe more importantly, a good performance, would do the players the world of good.