He means opposition fans right?
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We were on or around record pace for most of the season and only fell back to what in the end was an unremarkable final point tally for champions because we dropped a lot of points very late on. That was somewhat similar to Klopp’s last title challenge with the team the year before, but under Slot, unlike that season, it didn’t happen until we’d already wrapped up the title, doing so historically early with an entire month left to play.
What ifs are interesting and everyone will have their own takes, but I dont think we end up as low as 84 points if our season wasnt essentially over by the end of March.
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However we can clearly see that the quality and number of the top EPL sides had fallen. Some honesty is required!
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All fine. As I said, I think he did remarkably well last season. This year, being asked to integrate a raft of new players, maybe players he personally selected, he’s clearly struggled.
He isn’t unique in that. In fact, I think he was the right choice to take " Klopp’s team" last season. I do not think that you put anyone in that position and we win it. Not a chance.
But now asked to build his own PL team, and in a hurry, he’s struggled.
To summarise:
Slot did brilliantly last season.
He isnt doing well this season.
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I learn towards it being similar, because I think it echos Klopps last season.
We went out of the FA cup to Plymouth Argyle, lost league cup to Newcastle, lost our last group stage game to PSV before going out of the competition to PSG.
For all the talk of Slot conserving energy to preserve them over the season, I think they ultimately suffered the same fate as Klopp and he did not use the wider squad. (Were as Klopp was more intense but used more players).
Honestly the last 4 games they drew/lost (Chelsea, Arsenal, Palace and an away game to Brighton). I lean towards fatigue especially after what we have seen this season. But understand perspective we took foot off the pedal.
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Small squad mentality and lack of rotation.
We we’re dropping off when we were no longer playing to Gravenberch’s new found strengths and his performances were really dropping off due to fatigue.
Things were changing toward what we have had this season. That despite having a fantastic/brilliant start to the season.
We also have to factor in TAA and Salah that season who pulled us through so many games with extra-ordinary efforts to pull off draws and wins. Our season in the end was more down to them imo than anything else.
I also feel the holiday culture setting in didn’t help for what we are seeing this season.
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Watching Crouchy’s interview with Kloppo, it brought back one of the changes that Slot did for the team before match day: Players stayed at home the night before match day rather than being together in the team hotel. The players loved it when it was mentioned during various interviews. I wonder how much this change had in terms of long term impact in togetherness.
Of course, hindsight is 20/20.
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That is not disconnected from the more general improvement across the EPL though. Lower teams playing better and getting better results against the bigger teams means lower points, lower confidence and that feeds into poorer performances and lower perceived quality. If Newcastle, Villa, Palace and Bournemouth etc were easier to beat then the results for the “top” teams would be better, more consistent and have higher perceived quality.
The “gulf” between the top on mid/lower teams in the EPL has shrunk in the last couple of seasons. Some of that has been a drop in quality of the top teams* - and you can see that in the latter stages of the CL, in particular this year. The initial stage for the CL both this year and last shows that the general level of English teams that qualified was actually still pretty good though - so the bulk of the closing of the gap is a raising of quality and tactics from the mid/lower teams.
* I don’t think we should underestimate the impact the results lower/mid teams have been getting has on confidence and quality from the “better” sides too.
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What’s your point?
How is it not clear? By the most robust comparative metric available, the strength of the top sides in prem relative to those in the other leagues is still overwhelming. The idea they have got worse is a vibe not consistent with the data.
Manure are above us atm, I hope it doesn’t remain like that by the end, we have regressed, Everton are more likely to finish above us than we are to finishing 3rd.
Us and Chelsea are the evident examples however even Arsenal and Shitty aren’t as good as they were.
If the top teams regress sure the other teams will seem to be doing better.
At the end of the day we can only really go by what we see and I see a regression of the ‘top’ teams.
However we are comparing EPL sides with other EPL sides.
I just didn’t have a clue what your table was. A series of random numbers with countries in some sort of list.
Doesn’t do anything to help compare us to Everton imo.
The discussion point I was originally replying to related to last season, and whether the point total we won it with is comparable to other seasons and representative of quality. Arsenal are well on track to beat their point total from last season, Man City too. But they have continued regression from last season? See what I mean?
Also goes without saying that we have regressed 
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Perhaps the bigger issue was Slot’s decision to ditch Klopp’s training regime including the famous lactate test.
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You are now disagreeing with your own argument, Flobs.
If we are saying our top sides dont appear to be as impressive as they were in years past and are not as dominant, is it because they have got worse or the league has caught up some? Showing that our top sides are as competitive against the best sides in Europe as they have ever been is very strong evidence that the primary issue is the overall strength of domestic competition has improved.
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I can disagree with who ever I wish.
Your list had Italy is 2nd that’s enough to discount it imo 
.
There’s a typo in your response which is making it very difficult for me to follow what your saying.
I’m just going by what I actually watch which is LFC. I’m not going to delve into the stats and that. All I can say is from watching what I do I can not see that other teams in the EPL have improved, or changed that much tactically for that matter, we have regressed. Chelsea have regressed. Every season there’s 'winners and loser’s last year Man Shitty were losers and this season are better. Arsenal are so so about the same. Wolves have collapsed at last. Noway are Everton or Manure better they are just taking advantage of the others being poorer.
As @DrDamn pointed out I missed the point of his original post. However if we just look at last and this season we just notice the winners and losers not the general trend.
I suppose my position is what I accept as excuses for Slot. He started with a team and system last year that was head and shoulders above the lot. Then he lost the plot, so much so he ended up relying on 2 players to get the job done, and didn’t recognise what happened. That’s not good form.
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Gritted my teeth so hard saying that I’ve had to book a dentist appointment
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Hate Slot as much as Arteta.Talking about survival mode after spending 400 million.Complaining about teams parking the bus for months and then parking the bus against PSG.The guy is a massive hypocrite.
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