How much of that is down to fitness, and how much of it is down to having removed the defensive players from the pitch to put on more attackers who are then incapable of doing the defensive stuff when needed?
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McConnell is going to face the same issue as Morton did. If he is going to become a quality player, he needs regular games. If he is going to get regular games at Liverpool , he needs to be a quality player. It’s really difficult to make that work, outside a catastrophic injury crisis. He also has Nyoni ahead of him, whose ceiling is higher and is already closer to the first team.
I think the kid could be a really good player, but as always it’s incredibly hard to see how he makes it here without a move inbetween.
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Even under a head coach (instead of manager) system I would find it very unusual, if fitness and conditioning weren’t ultimately down to his oversight (doesn’t mean he’s literally handling it).
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We promoted Conall Murtagh to Head of the First Team Physical Performance department after Klopp left. However, Peeters arrived with the title of Lead physical performance coach having fulfilled that role for Slot in Holland. The official line of their partnership when they were first hired was how their methods are designed get players up to speed and allow them to last through the rigors of the season with an emphasis on individualized recovery time. For the outside you’ll never know exactly how teams like this work, but it seems pretty clear that while Peeters has a boss he reports to he was hired with the brief to prepare the players physically, arrived with some specific ideas about how that should be done at this level, and was in lock step with Slot about it all given he was explicitly a Slot hire
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This is what worries me, because if the fitness and training regime is coming from the director level then swapping the manager out is going to leave the problem in place.
Have I mis-remembered this, or was there some different approach to fitness introduced during Klopp’s last couple of seasons?
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There was a bit of a battle between the fitness and medical side of the club. Theoretically the fitness side is responsible for preparing the players and the medical side dealing with injuries and return to competition management post-injury. But the line between those is fuzzy. Medical will often want more involvement over proactive management of injury risk by having input on workload. Fitness will often want earlier ownership of the return to competition part of recovery. There is no right answer to that and every org has to find the balance that works for them (and often doesnt with lots of noses put out of joint). Towards the end of Klopp’s time we started getting reporting on how Klopp had wrestled more control from Medical for Kornmayer’s fitness side of the club, and it left several on the medical side feeling undercut and unhappy. But this is the battle that always exists.
Kornmayer left with Slot so it left room for that line to be redrawn between the medical and new fitness side of the org. But where the line got redrawn is, to my knowledge, not been reported on to any meaningful degree. And very likely wont because it really only got reported on previously because it was part of a “Klopp has become a problem at Liverpool” line of stories rather than because of the specific details being of interest to anyone.
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If true…waiting for the meltdown from some sections of the fans…
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Managers often have to fail to learn how to deal with the unique pressures of being at a club like this. They very very very rarely get the chance to apply those lessons immediately at the club where their failure occurred. The concern for me here is less that he doesn’t have the capacity to learn his lessons (although I haven’t seen evidence of it) but more how impaired this has made his relationship with the players he will have to work with next year.
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If Slot doesn’t have direct control over the conditioning and fitness of his players, he’s a unique case in world football.
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Rather than a meltdown, it’s better to accept that we will need to see Slot as our Manager until atleast the middle of next season. A bad start though will likely see him sacked by Christmas I will assume.
Hopefully, he can prove us all wrong and write this season off as a case of bad luck and things not quite gelling.
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Assuming that information is correct, I’ll be opting out of the Champions League next year; winning the league is far more important to me anyway.
I’m just waiting to see. I haven’t a clue what FSG are thinking and don’t care, I like to see the back of Slot as I feel he has lost his way and hasn’t a clue how to turn it around, not least as it requires others to change drastically as well.
I can not see how anyone could think that keeping on Slot could be a good idea. However I have long known we live in a mad world.
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I’ve said it a couple of times on here over the last couple of weeks that I would not be surprised if Hughes (Edwards and FSG) decide to keep Slot on for next season, and that we need to be ready for having in him charge.
Like most, there are other managers out there that I’d like to see come in. I am, however, also ok with Slot staying on, and would be hopeful that lessons have been learnt from this season. I assume that if things have gone to total shit between the manager and the team, then this kind of news would not be coming out today via the mainstream media.
Here’s hoping the players can win the last five of the season, finishing off with some confidence which might help some of us feel better about Slot staying on.
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For me the hierarchy seem to be kicking the can down the road hoping for a miraculous turn in form when there has been no indication of this happening the last 7 months.
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Could this be one of the reasons Salah and Robertson have publicly announced they’re leaving at the end of the season?
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Always said CL football would see him keep his job. Don’t think it’s the right decision but there’s risk in rolling the dice and risk in keeping him.
The fact him, Hughes and Edwards are all on deals ending next summer is probably telling.
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I don’t know whether Alonso is the right man for the job but I’d rather give him the opportunity over sticking with Slot for another season.
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I’m just not seeing anything to build on for next season. Yeah we’ve had injuries but nothing has gelled at all. In fact things that worked last year (Grav, Mac and Dom) have looked way worse this year.
Just feel it’ll be a wasted season and you’re then scrambling to find a Head Coach when there may not be any available ones out there.
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Not to mention that Alonso may not be available after the summer.
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