31 May 2026 07:39:01
{Ed's Note - PatrikBurgher has posted a new article entitled, Where Liverpool's Season Went Wrong Under Slot
31 May 2026 08:06:57
? What a load of Slot apologist nonsense. Delusional at best.
31 May 2026 08:09:48
Losing to Crystal Palace in the Community Shield.
31 May 2026 08:13:09
You thought we could win the Champions League in February, but now you've completely changed your view from what you believed before and wanted him gone?
"I still insist that the higher-ups did him a disservice by not sacking him earlier in the season."
31 May 2026 08:46:24
Patrick, let it go, he's gone, thankfully.
31 May 2026 08:52:11
I see the usual suspects coming out to call other people's opinions nonsense and delusional again. Not sure what you are looking to accomplish doing that? Clearly I am a lesser fan than you are, Chewy, give yourself a pat on the back for the acuity and clarity of vision. I took the time to articulate and offer my point of view, which you can take or leave. I would think that this is a safe and welcoming place to do so among other fans. It's always interesting reading what other people think.
That's how I feel about it anyway.
And C0ffan, yes I did believe we had a chance, and I wasn't the only one, I believe our team has a chance of beating anyone in cup competition. Was I calling for the manager's head in February? No, I wasn't, and nowhere in the article does it say that I did. I did say in February that it was a massive mistake not backing the manager with signings he needed, though, and retrospectively that feels like an ominous sign of things to come.
31 May 2026 09:05:11
Where exactly in the article did I say that he should have been sacked months ago? I'm saying that if the board didn't think that they would continue with him, and weren't going to give him the tools to succeed, then yes, they should have let him go. Clearly, we all saw how toxic things became in the end because of indecision. As long as Slot was in the seat, though, I would support the team and the manager.
That's how I've always felt.
Actually, I can see how the confusion has arisen now. It was a typo in the article - I didn't mean to type 'I still insist that the higher-ups did him a disservice by not sacking him earlier in the season', I meant to type 'I still insist that the higher-ups did him a disservice by not backing him earlier in the season when the squad needed a lift' by buying Guehi and Semenyo or Geertruida.
31 May 2026 09:07:25
He was lucky to win the league because we had no challenge. If we had, we would have crumbled in the final 3rd of the season as our fitness levels were not there by then.
He should have gone after Forest at home, but even if he had been given the opportunity to carry on, the next game, a 1-4 loss to PSV, should have never happened.
Yes, you can lose, but to lose like that to that PSV side is totally unacceptable.
31 May 2026 09:49:26
Patrick, everyone has opinions, that's life, but just because someone doesn't agree with yours, doesn't mean they are "attacking you", and it's not a safe place to air opinions. Sigh.
31 May 2026 09:56:31
"Slot apologist". Won't miss that one. Let's hope we don't have to have Ireola apologists on here.
31 May 2026 10:02:08
Good article, Patrick. I agree with most of it.
You don't win the league by that many points by luck, Grino. Utterly disrespectful imo. He's gone now. You can stop blaming life's woes on Slot and appreciate he had a chequered couple of seasons with us.
{Ed001's Note - the most disrespectful poster we have is whining about others being disrespectful - hypocrite.}
31 May 2026 10:08:44
The clock has reset for the new manager and like Slot he will get the support and time needed to do the job required. As for the article, Patrick, I'll leave it as, at no point did it look like we'd ever win the CL let alone any trophy. We were diabolical from game one, despite scraping a few wins.
31 May 2026 10:51:05
Gotta love ed001 - he's the barometer here. Spot on
31 May 2026 10:52:40
"It certainly did not help that we conceded an inordinate amount of spectacularly unlucky goals" – this is factually incorrect; we conceded a spectacular amount of goals because we were rubbish, no other reason. I haven't heard a single fan, player or pundit – not one person bar Slot, try and pedal that "unlucky" nonsense at all this season. What I have seen with my own two eyes is shocking defensive performances.
"Constant injuries because of players being overplayed" again, completely and utterly incorrect; the injuries that affected us had nothing to do with being overplayed whatsoever: Isak was unfit from the get-go, and the leg break obviously isn't from being overplayed.
Frimpong did his hamstring after just 60 minutes of football, not even 1 full game. Leoni, again not even a full game, succumbed to injury after just 80 minutes of football. Bradley took part in just 21 games prior to injury, of which he played beyond 70 minutes only 8 times and played less than 70 minutes a whopping 13 times. Endo played just 43 mins before his initial ankle injury, followed by 127 mins over 3 games before his ligament tear.
Ekitike was used the most of the three big injuries, but out of the 45 games he participated in, which is a total of 4, 050 minutes, he only played 2, 872 of them, just 70%. He playedjust 21 of those games beyond the 75 min mark, only 14 beyond the 80th min, and the full 90 mins in just 9 games.
Wirtz missed just 5 games for minor unrelated issues. Mo, Grav, Gakpo, Jones and Chiesa missed just 3 games each for minor issues. Alisson is 33 and regularly suffers from repeat hamstring injuries due to his sprinting technique. Bajetic and Dans are not worth mentioning because they were never in the squad and were never going to get a look in with Slot anyway.
So please, tell me, where are all these "constant injuries from players being overplayed"?
I genuinely want an answer to this question because I can't see how you could make such claims unless you're genuinely not watching games.
"I am pretty sure the flagging fitness of a small core of players having to play countless games on a knife's edge also meant that Slot had to ditch cohesive front foot pressing altogether" – completely incorrect on 2 counts: 1. The poor fitness levels have been there since the start of the season, absolutely no doubt about it, and it's clearly a result of the periodisation programme Peeters and Slot have been so famously implementing throughout their 5 year partnership, something that is likely contributing to injuries also. 2. The lack of pressing from the front, again, was happening from the start of the season and was clearly a tactical choice from Slot, not a result of a drop-off in fitness levels later in the campaign.
Florian, you're dead right, you won't miss it, I'll make sure of that mate! ?
31 May 2026 11:39:13
Nice to know you'll still be policing the site, Chewy. ?
31 May 2026 11:49:15
I think your point about injuries is perhaps correct and I am prepared to concede that framing things as such might be wrong on my part, but your huge focus on it is a bit pedantic.
My larger argument is more that constant overuse of players meant that they weren't fresh and prepared to exert maximal effort at any given time, and is it not true that, for example, when Wirtz and Ekitike seemed to be hitting a stride, either of them would pick up problems that prevented them from generating any momentum? Mac Allister was terrible all year, but he can't have been helped by having to play so many minutes on a consistent basis and having to cover huge spaces, exacerbating the issue. Also, my point about pressing is this- having seen Feyenoord and the Liverpool of last season play last year, I simply can't imagine that Slot wanted to drop the front press altogether. Rather, I think that he was conservative off the ball because of paranoia stemming from our disastrous collapse earlier in the season, was afraid of leaving huge gaps, but also because relying on the same core of players meant they weren't up to the demands of doing it in a sustained way more than once a week.
We showed several times in Europe that we could press in a coordinated way with pressing triggers, traps, forcing players out wide and swarming them etc. But a few days later in the league, with the same players, Slot opted not to do the same thing, often to disastrous results. Why would that be? Because that's his 'true' system? Yes, the players weren't conditioned to be able to go full throttle pressing from the front two or three times a week (and I can't imagine that any 11 players could do that anyway, hence the need for rotation), so you're right, but does that thereby make me wrong?
I just don't believe that the passive mid block that we settled into at the end of the season was Slot's endgame from the start, and if you watch the games from the beginning I don't know how you would be able to make that argument.
Yes, Slot has certain tendencies that tend towards conservatism, such as his dogmatic +1 principle and fixation with conserving energy (Klopp in a way was also fixated with conserving energy in a different direction, ie score two early doors and then take players off after an hour), but I don't think he wanted to play a passive midblock that stands around and watches the opposition pass without engaging the ball. Both Slot and the players became frightened and reactive over the course of the season, and I think a lot of it was a culmination of things that accumulated across the campaign.
It just feels really convenient to me for people to say that things would have always turned out this way for Slot, I think there were clearly several pivotal points where he could have made different decisions, managed the squad better, not forced the issue with Isak instead of playing Ekitike. I don't like this sort of determinist interpretation where Slot was doomed from the start because he was fundamentally inept, it's simply at critical moments he could, and maybe should, have done better.
Also I do believe that we conceded an inordinate amount of unlucky goals. Does that mean that I'm saying we were good defensively? We clearly were not. But we also conceded with the first sight the opposition got on goal, on the first set piece, etc.
31 May 2026 12:29:56
Facts are, Liverpool were not fit enough, we played the same players because he didn't trust other players, our style of play was abysmal, if it's not working you go back to the training ground n work on it, but by all accounts the training got less intense with frequent days off. It's ok trying to find out what went wrong but there is a lot of excuses made up, I thought like many others he should have went in November, we aren't mystic megs but we had eyes n we could see how this season would pan out.
Now we can all look forward to a coach who trains n drills the players on the training ground so we are ready for the actual football matches, one thing we should all ask of the players is to work hard n fight for the shirt.
31 May 2026 14:51:36
I give you some stat-based factual information and just because it proves you wrong, "I'm being pedantic" ? ok
No, I'm afraid you're incorrect. Nobody was overused, nobody was overexerted; we were off the pace from day 1, we were outrun by practically every team in the league, as a team and individually (bar Dom). We ranked 17th for most distance covered; Chelsea were outrun by every single team except us. let's not forget Slot & Peeters entire approach to coaching is built around increasing player availability by ensuring they're not overused. So it would be incredibly strange for them to be implementing this system only to be hampered by overused, overexerted players in spite of the fact that all the stats state the complete opoosite.
Again, wrong on the Wirtz/Ekitike theory; of the 45 games they could have played together, only 7 were missed due to injuries combined. If 2 of the top young prospects in world football can't make it work over a period of 30+ games, the culprit clearly isn't injuries.
MacAllister only missed 5 games due to injuries last season yet he was definitley operating at a higher workrate, had no issues, and had a great season, so what's your excuse there? This year he's had no injury concerns whatsoever, much lower output and yet you're saying he's overused, without any evidence at all. He's been poor all season long, from ay 1, if he was poor from being overused he woud have started well and deteriorated towards the tail end. Same goes for every other player.
You can't imagine Slot wanted to drop the press, that's fine, you're limited by your own imagination so, but the rest of us are here in the real world and we watched it with our own eyes, it happend, not entirely abandoned but the press was intentionally dialed back, no doubt, it was a very clear tactical shift that happened early in the season and not a result of exhaustion or the likes. There was no real mid block either, we were famous for letting teams walk through the middle this season. No real press, no mid bock, there was nothing, that's why the entire fenbase, pundits and ex pros alike have been quesioning our identity, because there's a clear lack of commitment to any one style of play from Arne.
Yes I agree, there was a little bit more pressing in the opening games, still nothing like Klopps, but it was leaving us stretched at times and we were leaking goals, that's part of he reason Arne deliberately dialed it back, which just made things 10x worse, its not something we settled into later in the season as you claim, it happend very early on. The slow football was there right from the start, and the reduced pressing happened within a handful of weeks.
No idea why you're suggesting we "played a passive midblock that stands around and watches the opposition pass without engaging the ball". That didn't happend, we had +70% psession in most of our games, we did press it was just dialed back, a lot. There was no true mid-block where we completely stood off the ball a la City v Arsenal in the FA cup final. It seems Slot tried to implement some sort of hybrid system that was neither one nor the other and so was ineffective in both reards. Whether he wanted to play it or not doesn't matter; he did. Nobody was frightened, we're talking about grown men here, they're chasing a ball around field at the end of the day, not a lion.
I'm not saying it was always going to turn out this way for Slot, maybe it could have worked out, but he would have had to radically change his approach. Something he showed absolutely no sign of or willingness to do, this was arrogant, incompetent and borderline pig ignorance to be brutally honest, and even when asked directly if he would change his approach for next season, he essentially said 'No, it's my way or the highway, ' and he emphasised that quite strongly. This shows that the style we played was intentional and likely to continue had he stayed on. He's very straightforward Arne, a little too much so, there's no mind games, he's been crystal clear about the fact that the footballing philosophy does not need to change, which goes entirely agains the Liverpool way, whether you like it or not. He's also been adamant that the reasons for our poor season are bad luck and poor decisions; he wholeheartedly believes that, again, highlighting a level of incompetence uncacceptbale at this level.
He might have even saved himself had he owned up to his mistakes, had he said something like "Look, we started the season poorly, I tried to change things around to minimize the dammage, it's not what I wanted to do, but it's what I felt was necessary at the time, maybe I was wrong, it didn't work out but we've learned our lesson and next season things wil be different, we're going to get back to playing the Liverpool way." But he didn't; he was steadfast in his belief that his approach to footbal was not the issue, that a change of luck and a couple of sinings would fix it all. Borderline delusional.
At the end of the day the slow posession based football is what killed us, that is the core issue, forget the lack of pressing, forget the inept midblock, forget the team selection or the injuries. there's an immense wealth of talent in that squad but somehow it never looked like it, and that's because Slot deliberately played slow posession based football which sucked the life out of some fantastic footballers and has gone completely against everything this team has done and known for the last 8 years. The very fact that Mo spoke out about this directly and every other player liked it shows you it's not just a theory; it's hard fact.
So believe what you like; denial isn't a river, but you might just drown in it.
*Lets not forget that we saw plenty of these elements creeping in during the latter half of last season and particularly towards the tail end, before Diogo, before the new signings, before the outgoing transfers etc.