Arne Slot - Head Coach

The Albert
8595

It did tickle me seeing you arguing with each other when there is a lot of back slapping in the politics thread - joke.

I think both sides of the argument are right and maybe better judged with hindsight.

Didn’t Slot start JQ in the first game and haul him off after a shaky 1st half. None of us know if this was out of frustration or protecting JQ. JQ actually looked very shaky in the game time he was given, mistakes, own goal(s), which was a shame because he performed well when required the Season before. There was also gossip about his off the pitch antics and Only Fans.
Slot also gave Nallo a chance and he got sent off twice.

It is a Hughes/Edwards fuck up irrelevant of whether Slot liked him or not. At the time it was a good deal, like the money we were supposedly getting for Elliot. The option for JQ to get 1st team football in a league which has been good for young English players development.
The fuck up is, JQ squad position was not replaced. Why did we leave it to the last minute to go for Guehi? Why was cover not signed already?
Why did we negotiate a loan to buy deal with Villa, a club struggling with PSR and have now renegaded on the deal.
My only conclusion (and I maybe incorrect with Elliot in terms of HG/PSR) is that the figures were used to balance the books from an accounting view.
So I can’t accept this being on Slot and no one knows how our season would have been different if we had kept either. JQ could have broke his leg in the 1st game.
The issue/fuck up is that we didn’t have that option. So if Konate/or a 30+ VVD got injured/lost form we were going to rely on Joe Gomez, who can’t even rely on his own body.
Maybe Gravy/Endo were seen as cover? We played Robbo at CB in the friendlies. Either way they were all bad decisions.

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8596

I’m not sure what’s worse. When we have football, or when we don’t :joy:

We’ve been so crap that a little break from the old footie might give us a chance to take a breath, walk the dog, read a book, etc.

But no football is also doing strange things to us, as we are going round and round on Quansah.

If nothing happens with Slot very, very soon; he’s here until the summer, so it’s time to regroup and hope we finish in the CL spots and don’t get a shellacking against PSG.

8597

The amount of times fans call for players to be taken off, sold, whatever…

In the end, quality usually prevails.

8598

I usually hate the International breaks, however, as the Season has gone on, I have over optimistically seen them as an opportunity for the players to reset from the break. Sadly my optimism was little more than just that.

For me it is clear Slot is here until the Summer and we can’t resign JQ, so we just all have to grin and bear it. Cross all of our digits and Pray.

I wonder if anyone is secretly hoping JQ international call up is a success or failure to suit there side of the argument :joy:

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8599

Exactly, so you can see the logic for selling him with a buy back clause. Selling a Fringe squad player for 40m with option to buy back and replacing him with a Guehi a Club captain, England CB for less money was a no brainer. However, we didn’t. Was it Palaces fault for pulling the deal or us for leaving it to the last minute? Who knows. The result of which we do know is that we didn’t sign anyone, and that goes for the January window also. *I know we signed the French lad but no one to help the team out this Season.

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8600

Palace also had a tricky summer, their own problems to think about, targets and yeah, obviously it wasn’t ideal for them either to have such a decision so late, but they made one and that’s it. I can live with that sort of thing. Shit happens in life, shit happens in football. There doesn’t have to be one guilty person/party for everything that happens in this game, some conspiracy or whatever.

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8601

What’s that got to do with the shithouse way he treated a young player, mate?

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8602

why?, is there something else we are meant to be doing on here?

8603

not always though…

how many guys have you seen that would have better control than Jamie Carragher for instance…

8604

I had no issues with what Arne did in that game, where I do have issues with is that it has to be consistent and thats where he fails, others have had far far worse games and not been withdrawn.

It is as what many of us have said, bullying he picked on the the youngest and most inexperienced player to make an example of and the worst is, no consoling words of support to Quansah after.

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8605

Bad faith from Palace, I think. We had accommodated them as much as possible, but they pulled the plug without warning.

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8606

That’s one aspect of a player.

8607

He didn’t treat him in a shithouse way. He didn’t badmouth him. He didn’t constantly attack him. He took him out of the team, explained why when asked and then didn’t play him very much again. Which is his prerogative. He is the manager/head coach and he selects the team he wants. His job is to win games for Liverpool, and while he is winning them his team selections are justified.

I’ve seen comparisons with Mourinho’s trick of isolating a player as a warning to the others like he did with Luke Shaw. Which is absurd. He made Shaw train alone, he constantly made barbs about his weight, his ability, his professionalism. He used him as a scapegoat for everything that went wrong. That was bullying. What Slot did was not rate a player, and pick his team accordingly.

This isn’t u9 football, where everyone gets equal game time, a big clap and told they are great after every game. This is big boy football. If you think Slot should have picked Quansah more, that’s fine, but Slot was in charge, he got to pick the team, and he won the league.

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8608

I completely agree that things happen. I am not suggesting any conspiracy theories or laying the blame. I am not really bothered whose fault it was because it is now irrelevant. I was just giving my perspective on the situation. But, I stand by my point that we put all our eggs in the one basket, Glasner didn’t make his ultimatum on the last day, there was apparently a take it or leave it offer on the table. No other clubs made bids because personal terms had all been agreed and he had his heart set - I believe.

The issue was we didn’t learn our lesson from the Covid season and make sure we had 3 or 4 specialist CB’s who were fit. Admittedly we signed Leoni, who did look good in his first 30 minutes but was then unfortunate with a season ending injury, but again, he was/Is a gamble.
In January we agreed a deal of £50m+ for a CB and let him finish the season at his current club.
So, if we are spending £50m on a Defender for next season it is completely a higher management decision. Slots job was (still is on the line), Konates form was patchy, two injured RBs, a half working Gomez and it was not a priority.
To me it kind of tells me they had written off the season and were willing to muddle on through as we were.

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8609

“It says a lot about his mentality,” Slot told Friday’s pre-match press conference at the AXA Training Centre. "Last season I think everybody saw what a talent he is. Then this season started with him starting and I changed him as we all know against Ipswich.

"Ibou [Konate] and Virgil [van Dijk] were and are such a strong combination that he didn’t play a lot. But every time he had to play, except for maybe the first one or two games, but afterwards he had to play you could see that maybe he is no longer a talent because as a talent you don’t have any setbacks, but the moment you get setbacks it’s about you and how you react.

"I think he showed in his recent performances that he’s outgrown being called a talent. That’s probably what Thomas Tuchel saw and sees as well by giving him a call-up. He did really well the last few times he had to play for us and even in a position he’s not completely used to as a right full-back.

"But in my opinion, he has also the qualities to play in that position. He’s strong, he’s fast, he’s very comfortable with the ball and it gives us an extra quality if we play him, which we saw [against Paris Saint-Germain], in terms of set-pieces because he was the one that was this far away from us qualifying for the next round by heading the ball onto the post, because that one was not offside.

“He showed mentality and that he had quality. That’s already what we knew when we saw him playing last season.”

On how Quansah has bounced back from his half-time substitution on the opening day of the season at Ipswich Town, Slot added: "Although if being substituted at half-time is a setback then almost every player has more than a few setbacks during his career.

"I think it was more that people, from what I said after the game, people were not used to maybe a manager or me being so clear about what I saw and what I did. That in the end probably went to a situation where he got criticised more than what’s normal for a player that gets taken off at half-time.

"Again, it’s so good to see he managed his way back into it. Now already before the winter break he already had a few good moments as well. Every time we now need him, he does really well.

"I think mentality-wise it might’ve been a good or big moment for him that Ipswich game, because now he experienced that people were not only positive about him like last season. Although he made one or two mistakes back then as well.

“He also knows now he can fight his way back if people all of a sudden are not positive anymore. That is something I think every player should experience in the start of his career because a football career is never only going up, it’s always going a bit like this [up and down]. Now he knows he can fight back also after a situation he experienced at Ipswich, or after the Ipswich game.”

8610

I do have to disagree with part of your point, admittedly with the benefit of hindsight.

I feel you have to take into consideration it was the first game of the Season and also Slots first league game, He made a call and got it right as we won the Game. I am sure there would be the same people calling him out on his decision if he had left JQ on and we lost the game.
I know you are not a fan of Slots and a majority of the Fan base don’t like him but give him a bit of slack for last season, I mean he did win the Title.
If people want to caveat it as Klopp’s team and him (Slot) being a fraud then that is completely up to them :+1:t2:, and whilst I appreciate there are if, buts and maybes but had he left JQ on and we lost, then we would have started the season on the back foot and may not of won the league.

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8611

Yeah the defensive recruitment has been a huge balls up and, cumulatively the ‘unforseen’ events paint the picture of a poorly performing recruitment team. Hughes should be on thin ice at this point and expecting bricktop to be waiting underneath.

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8612

To be honest it’s easier to make another Slot thread :rofl:

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8613

That’s all well and good but as we all know Salah, Konate, MacAllister and Gakpo have stunk the place out game after game this season when we haven’t been winning and yet their places were more or less guaranteed next match. That’s no exaggeration.
So what’s the difference between those 4 and Quansah? Not difficult is it?

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8614

I will find my old post, but right at the start of Slots career here I said his bluntness concerned me. He is very Dutch, direct, to the point and little filter. I described when everything is going well it’s refreshing, but I was concerned when things don’t go so well.

Here is an exert from an article from that Ipswich game

*Lineker said: *“That speaking out publicly about a player’s performance is not something that you would’ve ever heard, I don’t think, from Jurgen Klopp, so there’s already a slight difference there. I’m always slightly nervous when managers or coaches are publicly critical of their players.”

We agree with Lineker that we wouldn’t be in favour of managers routinely throwing their players under the bus and publicly humiliating then in the manner that Jose Mourinho [has often done in the past](Jose Mourinho: England's Luke Shaw does not understand criticism by former manager - BBC Sport)

It was bold by Slot to namecheck Quansah in stating his dissatisfaction with Liverpool’s struggles to deal with Ipswich aerially in the first half on Saturday, but the decision to withdraw him for Ibrahima Konate at half-time was vindicated by the eventual result and the dominance we enjoyed after the interval.”

In some ways mascot is correct. Just like this article you can argue the ends justifies the means.

The challenge today, the repercussions are now being felt. We pay the cost of that bluntness. Impacts confidence, nurturing players and trust.

Many manager has made a sucessful career being outspoken and blunt (Clough, Mourinhio etc). However when shit hits the fan it’s much harder to hold it all together.

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