Slot's Broken Machine

Not since Brian Clough entered the Leeds United dressing room and told his new players to throw their medals in the bin, has a coach managed to upset a happy team the way Arne Slot has in the last six months. Bizarrely, the Dutch coach decided to win a league title before working his dark magic.

In season 1, it was a case of ‘less means more’ and Slot managed to cajole his senior players into six months of excellent performances. Like the world weary supply teacher who finds his new juvenile delinquents are actually a fairly civilized bunch, Slot is only now realising that the previous teacher was probably more than a little responsible for the group he inherited. He’s realizing it, no doubt, but it may  be a case of too little late with regards to this epiphany.

The plan?

After storming the league last year, Slot was keen to improve upon his experienced group of stodgy old pros. PSG outplayed them and he was fed up with winning 1-0. It was a stressful way to win the league and he wanted some more 2-0 and 3-0 wins to underline his superiority. Of course, as the manager, his role was clearly to strive for improvement, but within this desire to win more easily lay the seeds of his current perilous predicament. His desire for complete makeover was underlined by the signing of Florian Wirtz, the German wunderkind from Bayer Leverkusen. A luxury player that was promised a free role, and no doubt his killer passes were expected to lead to goals number 2, 3 and 4 in those convincing wins over mid-table sides such as Nottingham Forest and Crystal Palace.

There was more than a touch of arrogance in his plan, but after winning the premier league at his first attempt, who can blame Arne for some hubris.

In a team which so much on a hard-working midfield trio, such a signing was always going to be risky, but Liverpool compounded the error with the signings of Ekitike and Isak, and the accompanying sales of Nunez and Diaz. Somewhere in the backrooms of Anfield, somebody was left alone with a cheque book and a copy of Sun Tzu’s ‘Art of War’ and opted to win the league before a ball was even kicked. To encourage Isak to down tools – and we can only assume that’s what happened – and at the same time deprive Newcastle of their chosen replacement in Ekitike, was the type of masterstroke that no self-respecting executive could refrain from. It was unbelievable. And it was very clever. And Karma is a bitch.

Meanwhile the fiery, hard-working South Americans were allowed to leave alongside the home-grown squad players like Elliot, Kelleher and Quansah. And the tragic death of Diogo meant that one more fighter was missing.

Not that ripping up a title winning side is always a bad thing. It’s something that managers like Sir Alex Ferguson and Marcello Lippi did regularly. The difference is, that it was their side they were ripping up. Slot was ripping up Klopp’s side and that was always going to be a more delicate operation. Also, Liverpool had decided to keep their oldest players and hand them fat new contracts. So really it was still the old team, but with some fancy new additions. Like somebody knocking down their garage to create a games room next to the house and then realising there’s nowhere to park the car. In fact, you’ve still got a couple of beloved old Ferraris and you don’t want to park them on the street!

Continuing the metaphor, Marc Guehi from Crystal Palace was the secure parking place round the corner which might have softened the blow. But after spending hundreds of millions buying expensive toys, Liverpool decided to haggle over a car port.

Added to these blunders, was the strange decision to give Giovanni Van-Bronckhorst the Assistant Manager’s job. Van Bronckhorst was a great player, and a decent enough manager too – taking Glasgow Rangers to Europa League final – but why not choose an experienced ‘coach’ to replace the departing Jonny Heitinga? Why bring  in a second manager? And a fairly high profile one at that. Strange.

The scene was undoubtedly set then for a tricky transitional season, but Slot seems to be have been doing his damnedest to magnify the issues presented to him. By playing an unfit Isak next to a leggy looking Salah he’s ensured that every member of the defence (and midfield) is exposed in a way they never were under Klopp. And sometimes he’s played Wirtz too, just in case Konate and Van Dijk were wanting to catch their breath.

Rather than let Kerkez win his place from Robertson, he decided to jettison the popular vice-captain from day one. Only to be forced into reinstating Robbo for those games he needed to win. It turns out that Robbo’s confidence and composure was an integral part of the previous system; poor Kerkez often seems like a headless chicken in comparison.  Especially now that Trent Alexander-Arnold, one of the the most skilful right-backs in the history of the game, has left a big hole on the other side of the defence.

Meanwhile Ekitike, the one new player who is contributing, is treated like an unwanted orphan at the foodbank.

It seems as though Slot is still focussed on improving upon those 1-0 wins and if that means losing 3-0 in the process, then it’s the price he has to pay for building the next super team.

At this stage it seems unlikely that Slot will escape unscathed from this slow motion train wreck of a season. Pride comes before a fall, I’m afraid. He didn’t realise what an achievement it was to win the league last year and his insistence on building a new dynasty from scratch can only be seen as a slight on the squad he inherited.

And his management since the start of the season has only been successful in alienating and demotivating both elements of his team; the old and the new.

The mood of the squad can perhaps summed up in a twitter exchange involving Salah which took place before the season began. Somebody had tweeted in delight about the wonderful upgrade from Nunez and Diaz, to Isak and Wirtz. Salah felt the offense personally and reminded the tweeter that Isak Diaz and Nunez were premier league winners and should be shown more respect.

I don’t think the tweet came from Slot, but it might as well have.