31 Oct 2025 08:06:09
Arne Slot has liberally employed a version of "it's not an excuse but . " throughout Liverpool's worst domestic run in 72 years and there were several more examples as he defended his makeshift lineup for the Carabao Cup defeat by Crystal Palace. Slot also appeared to be getting one in early for the visit of Aston Villa when explaining Liverpool's senior players had to be rested: "Again, we face a team that has rested in the week to play us. " However, the same could be said for Liverpool, with the majority of their squad given the night off on Wednesday to spend more time preparing to face a Villa team with six wins in their past seven outings.
Slot's prioritising of a league game over progress in the Carabao Cup stirred memories of Brendan Rodgers' far more consequential decision to rest Steven Gerrard, Philippe Coutinho and Raheem Sterling against Real Madrid in 2014 to save their legs for Chelsea on the Saturday. Liverpool then lost 2-1 at home and the pressure their manager had invited duly intensified. Slot must avoid a repeat. There are no excuse.
31 Oct 2025 08:31:49
Any truth in the news today Elliot may return to the reds?
31 Oct 2025 08:34:02
I'm not sure what your 'whatever' is supposed to mean? One of the reasons why he rested players was because Villa would be getting a week's rest, they wouldn't have if he didn't make that decision.
I see people in the press saying that Slot's choice was a sign of him panicking and being desperate to salvage our premier league form, I don't see how that makes sense? If anything it is a sign of him not panicking and sticking to his decision to field a rotated side regardless. Sure, if we weren't hit with injuries, maybe he would have had a few senior figures to throw on to get a result.
Given that Hugo got a red and Leoni got a season ending injury the last time out, and the fact that advancing in the competition would mean a fixture pileup further down the line at a time when we have bigger fish to fry in terms of getting our house in order for the league and the champions league, I really don't understand fans saying that Slot doesn't have a clue etc. etc.
Of course if we lose against Villa I'm sure folks are going to pile on Slot again saying he surrendered a piece of silverware, but there is plenty of rationale behind why he would make the difficult decision, given the circumstances, to do so?
Comparing him to Brendan really really doesn't make sense either, this wasn't a champions league game under the lights against Real, with fans of both sides paying big money to watch a game between two traditional footballing giants. Traditionally we have always played a rotated side in the league cup to give minutes to fringe players and academy standouts.
31 Oct 2025 08:47:19
Good post, that, PB.
31 Oct 2025 08:50:15
'However', I mean, not 'whatever'.
31 Oct 2025 08:52:26
Saturdays fixture is a must win.
Next Tuesday is a huge fixture v Real but only on paper as two of the biggest clubs in the world meet. Winning that game however isn't a must win. All we have to do to not be eliminated from the CL is not finish below 23rd.
Then next Sundays is another must win for me or we could find ourselves as bad as 8 points off top 4 let alone the title.
Obviously 3 wins would be the ideal outcome but 2 wins in the league and a draw with Real would still be a very good outcome. Even a loss in the CL isn't the end of the world if we win both league games.
31 Oct 2025 09:01:31
Good post PB. Slot did the right thing and it took guts to do it as he knew the backlash he’d get.
Now, as expected people are using it as a stick to beat him with but if he’d played Virgil and he’d got injured the same people would be saying why risk first team players in a nothing competition?
31 Oct 2025 09:02:53
Thanks Rigsby, I appreciate you as always. I understand people are saying that Slot's decision is a 'gamble', but I mean, every single managerial selection decision is a gamble, so that statement seems kind of redundant to me? Let's say we won the league cup game giving 45-60 mins to our star players, and even if nobody got injured (folks saying Slot is scared to death of injuries right now and that it's irrational, is it really? it's not like we're having player pull up with injuries every game now), if that affected them in a way that led to even a marginal physical drop off against Villa, would that be worth it just so we could feel like we were back in business/ the pundits wouldn't be on our backs for a few days?
I understand ed001's point that players can get injured in training, and if you were to ask me I would, like I imagine Klopp would, play Virgil and Mo in the game anyway because Mo needs form and never gets injured/ tired anyway, and the chance of Virgil getting muscle injuries because of overwork is historically so low. I think there is just cause for criticism for Slot not having some more leaders in our team and in our spine to at least have a go at the game, especially with two of our players that traditionally are much less at a risk injury-wise than others.
I do, however, think that some of the criticism is overboard, with people saying that Slot's decision senseless and ridiculous, and they can see no explanation for it. He literally gave his explanation in the press conference, calm as always. You can be angry with his explanation or not accept it, and we will see if his justification holds water with a better, well-coached and well thought out performance against Villa, but some of the stuff being said about the league cup game just doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.
31 Oct 2025 09:07:53
Johnny, I just read that article before coming on here and this is not a serious article as it is flawed from the jump. The writer tries to compare Slot who essentially forfieted a game in the "mighty" Carabao Cup (a comp. where multiple teams play a mix of young/ fringe players) to BR benching our top guns in a CL (I repeat, a Champion's League) game away at the Bernabeau to get ready for a PL game vs Chelsea.
Really? So he/ she is comparing forfeiting in Carabao Cup game to forfeiting a Champion League game away at RM of all places? Did we play RM in the CL or Palace in the Carabao Cup? See, this is where as I always say, people do way too much and try to make 2 and 2 equal 4, only to end up being 22. Again, the correlation is nonsensical and this journo is not a serious person, IMO.
To me, this is just another case of a journo (a very lazy one at that) trying to compare apples to pineapples just cos the word "apples" resides in both words. Also, to compare the situations with BR (a smooth talker with no trophies to back it up) to that of Slot (with a PL in his kitty) is another nonsensical comparison. For me, this is all hot air and white noise from the journo to try to pile on. It failed, IMO. On to Villa and hoping for a win (not sure how that's going to happen, tho) .
31 Oct 2025 09:27:05
Oli - they need to get clicks and provide content - which is always opinion. No one really knows what's going on behind the scenes. I thought some of it was fair, especially the part of Slot making lots of excuses, which doesn't sound good.
31 Oct 2025 09:52:54
Oli i'd imagine the fans who were actually at Anfield on Wed night might disagree with your "Mighty" Carabao cup opinion.
You've admitted you didn't even watch the game nor watch any game live.
Maybe if you did you could sympathize then with fans that feel a little short changed.
31 Oct 2025 10:07:25
I just can’t see us going from playing the worst football we have seen in the last 5 months (including the of the season) to being able to beat Villa, RM and city in the space of a week. But stranger things have happened in football so who knows. The biggest week in Slots career will he sink or swim!
31 Oct 2025 11:02:35
Johnny, I agree that Slot is making excuses (there are actually some whoppers on there, I have to admit) BUT didn't need a an article to tell us that. It is the nonsensical correlation that I have issues with.
31 Oct 2025 11:03:54
Liverpool have played in the League Cup for years while also competing in the League and CL at the same time. Is it only Slot that gets to make the excuse of a team that had a week to prepare? Did Klopp ever play such a weakened team and bench?
All I am seeing are poor excuses.
Slot hung Wednesdays team out to dry and has just added more pressure onto an already awful run of results.
31 Oct 2025 11:32:54
If we had beaten Palace with a full strength side, we would then have been away to Arsenal. Can anybody realistically see us winning that game. I know we beat them there earlier, but we weren't then in a run of awful performances.
31 Oct 2025 12:19:02
Oli, its a tough call cause no one other than City have the resources to go full-tilt in 4 comps, and i personally believe, rightly or wrongly, that the FA and league cup greatly contributed to us running out of steam during 2 seasons under Klopp.
It does raise a question about squad depth after such a big spend though - it seems there is still plenty of selling and buying to do before we find balance. Id say Gomez, Endo and chiesa all need replacing with viable options, along with 2 x CB's.
31 Oct 2025 16:37:59
In terms of buying and selling still to be done from back to front we probably still need a goalkeeper to replace Ali, a new right back to compete with Connor, centre backs to replace Konate and also Virgil, a defensive centre mid to replace Endo and Mac, a right winger to replace Mo.
That’s a lot of business to be done again over the course of the next two windows. The issue has been compounded by the form of Mo and VVD as those positions need sorting before their contracts expire, particularly Mo.