Must have been rough for him.
You win the league, belief at an all time high and the fans love you. The start of your legacy.
Then, over the next season, you watch it all crumble before your eyes, piece by piece, and you can´t do anything to stop it.
Thing is…maybe FSG woke up Fri or Sat and decided to sack him with no real plan in place.
We don’t have a manger announced and Ireola was in Germany for talks with Bayer on Friday - if it was so well thought out we would’ve have announced the new guy already and there would’ve been no need for him to go Germany for talks he didn’t need to have.
This season we’ve questioned everyone’s ability bar probably Ekitike.
The thing I still can’t understand is why he persisted with Macca match after match when he stunk up the joint.
Put Jones in there!! You bigged up Curtis when you came in, what happened to all that!
I’ve never absolved Slot of his responsibilities, ever. But I do think that it’s would be decent of us to make sure we are criticising him for things that are actually fair and within his control.
One of the problems we have as fans is that it
has has never been made clear where that responsibility starts and ends. All we can say for sure is that the structure changed after Klopp, and the head coach is focussed more on working with the players around training and matchday and less on the strategic leadership. I think that means to a much greater extent than Jurgen, Slot was expected to work with the players provided for him. I think he obviously had some input into the strategy, but he was a less influential voice in the room that Klopp was.
It looks to me like what we’ve done with the post Klopp structure is planned for a future where the head coach is a less irreplaceable component in the machine, accounting for the fact that totemic messiah figures like Jurgen don’t come around very often. That’s probably quite a good idea. But the accountability for the club needs to shift upwards along with it.
People like Hughes and Edwards don’t talk. They never put their heads above the parapet. The don’t answer questions. They are not available for comment. Very we’re very keen to have their photos taken with the big cup. They were very keen to smoke their cigars on the parade bus. But when things are going wrong and the strategy - their strategy - is wobbling, they fucking hide. And it’s left to the head coach to front the shithouse questions from the media and the comments from fans.
Even something as emotionally as draining as Jota’s death was an example of this. Why was it left to Slot to front the club through that tragedy? Where were Hughes and Edwards? Why did Hughes not feel any responsibility to make himself available to the media and the fans, and take some of the burden off his head coach?
I am in violent agreement with this 
!!
You can’t have the power but not the responsibility.
I don’t disagree but it’s always seemed like the more Jones plays the more criticism he gets from fans about holding the ball too long or not contributing enough.
I would hope a new manager coming in would give him pause about looking elsewhere for at least another season.
I agree with most of this, and it’s a much more sensible take than the conspiratorial nonsense that is floating around the socials.
But what I have a problem with is the idea that the process of season, review, decision to a set timetable is sacrosanct.
If they only came to the conclusion that a change was necessary on Friday, that is a problem for me because there nothing that was going to change that outcome from the final few games of the season. Even securing Champions League football (as I’ve argued in the past) shouldn’t really be the casting factor - you can fluke your way in or be desperately unlucky to miss out.
Where that’s ended up is missing out on outstanding managerial candidates, stringing on people as they make their life plans and decisions. It might not really matter in the grand scheme of things, but it makes the club look like they are acting in bad faith or being incompetent.
Some rotation management would have helped I would have thought.
Why these players didn’t get more minutes is beyond me.
To be blatant, part of fans criticism for Jones is exactly that he holds onto the ball too much or that he just can’t become a starter in this team.
I’m almost completely sure though that his ability to keep the ball is actually one of his biggest strengths in the eyes of coaches (regardless of their type).
Players who are quality on the ball will always have sequences or actions when, yes, they could’ve passed it earlier. The best ones and the less good ones. I like the ability he has in the first place. When we talk about the ball being faster than the player and playing one or two touch football, we know that it’s actually impossible to literally play that way.
He’s a good player, but may never become what some of his most positive surporters think he’s got the potential for. I would prefer him to stay than to leave.
Maybe, but some in or out activities will still go ahead, regardless if it was Slot still here, Iraola or someone else.
All I’m saying is use your subs. For those that argue against using the squad seem to be saying it’s one or the other. That’s not what’s being said at least by me. It’s tiresome to be honest, particularly with all the games we play.
Any self respecting boss would be assessing continuously.
There has been a lot of reasons for a down turn in our season that was out of Arne’s hands, but then again what he could control had no plan or solutions, we were a tactical mess.
I think Hughes and Edwards wanted to give him every chance to turn it around but alas the performances were getting worse.
I would have done it sooner, however they wanted him to suceed, but in the end they had to release him.
It is no good having the ability and skill to hold onto the ball then getting played at RB twenty metres from your own goal line…
If Curtis has a future at LFC, he needs to be played more regularly in a position he can thrive in… what position that is, becomes anyone’s guess…
Only then can he be judged as to whether he has a consistent vein of form to churn out performance after performance at the higher end of the scale, or whether he continues, as he does now and flatter to deceive…
I disagree. You can’t be doing the season review before the season is done. If for no other reason than you want the manager focussed on the final games and not looking over his shoulder wondering if he’s going to still have a job. If you’ve committed to him seeing the season out then you take stock once the season is done.
If that means Alonso goes elsewhere then so be it. People are acting like he’s a guaranteed success we’ve simply missed out on because of timing. But if he was someone they really wanted, and I mean that in the way they really wanted Klopp, then they’d have timed their moves accordingly. The fact they haven’t tells you they don’t view him that way and saw no rush to act. Time will tell if they’re right on that one.
There’s nothing that suggests incompetence. In fact it points to a highly considered and methodical approach. You want incompetence take a look at Chelsea. Sacked one manager, panic appointed one from their sister club and then sacked him as their CL hopes disappeared. Then changed their model and gave up some control to secure their new manager. I’d happily miss out on Alonso if it means we’re not flapping around like they have been.
It looks like Iraola was always the default option should they not continue with Arne this season.
If they wanted Alonso they would have had to sack Slot about 4 weeks ago, that’s just not going happen and I wouldn’t want the club to do that and I am not sure he’s actually “an outstanding candidate”, he has yet to bounce back from adversity at a club and he would get more time from the fans I am fine with the club seeing the season out, reviewing it and then deciding to get rid.
Also if you are referring to the assistant coach we haven’t made that appointment and the review was always going take place.
Jones’ elevation from decent squad player that half the forum would happily bin off for a shinier toy to essential player that has been criminally marginalised can be mapped perfectly against how much every hated the manager.
I’ve argued for years that Jones is a good player who should be valued as a squad player. Basically if Jones is your fifth choice midfielder for a pool of three, you are in exceptionally good shape. But if he is first name on the team sheet, we’re in trouble.
Every club needs players like Jones. He should be getting 25 starts a season, and rotating in regularly. You can rely on him, he won’t let you down, and he is perfectly good enough for most games.
The problem is, and I suspect that this is the case with Curtis, is that there comes a time when they want to be the main man. Jones was tearing a strip off Klopp for not playing him when he was 18. This is not a lad lacking in self-confidence.
With Curtis, I think we have found ourselves in a similar situation to Konate. His contract demands are going to be greater than the club see him, and he’ll expect to be playing more regularly than he is now. The only question then becomes do we let him see out the season and go for nothing, or do we sell him now? The attraction of the latter is than the club get to book pure profit under PSR rules.
Having said all this, I spent a lot of the season moaning that Jones should be starting ahead of Macca, who had an absolutely wretched season. But the long term solution to that is that the club should be bringing in a better player than Macca or Jones.
By the way I think we’re going to run into an equally difficult situation with Szoboszlai this summer. He has two years left on his contract, and if he doesn’t sign a new one now the club need to give serious thought to moving him on while his stock is relatively high. Getting some discipline on contracts is no bad thing, and if players don’t agree to a new deal two years out, then they should be sold. The fans will howl about it, but they’ll also howl when we let players get down to the last year and then leave on a free.
Interesting:
Both players and staff insist that Slot was also unfairly criticised externally for the amount of time off he granted to the squad. Club data shows that the squad had 47 days off across the 2023-24 season, Klopp’s final campaign, compared to 50 in 2024-25 and 45 in 2025-26.
I thought that was a bit of an eye opener. Is it a case that the days off are ending up on Social Media more, and hence the perception that they are constantly off on a beano?
It’s a good idea for most clubs, but there is something different about the manager role at Liverpool. Doesn’t have to be a messiah, but at least a unifying leader that we can believe in