He has to finish in the top four. Make the knockouts in the UCL. Have a decent run in at least one of the domestic cup competitions. Would be nice if he wins a cup, but it will be fine if he doesn't. Most importantly I want to see him impose his identity as quickly as he can. That's the key going forward. Benitez did that. Klopp did it. You could see it. I hope Slot does that too. As long as he can do that with finishing in the top 4, I will take it. Sorting out contracts of some of the key players is important, but that's not his job.
I'd love us to show the kind of free flowing football the Kop can really get behind ,yeah some filthy football that terrifies our opponents. If I see that coming to fruition then I'll be more than happy ,but if that's not enough for him and he wants to make Kopites delirious and orchestrate a genuine tilt at the league ,then maybe he could also do a Rafa and win the Champions League in his first season ? In all seriousness though ,I'd love us to become genuinely feared in Europe again ,because I think that aura kind of died on it's @rse with our last European adventure.
Hopefully fast one touch passing. All teams wax and wain. You have to earn the right to be feared and honestly if you pay reserves and don't take a game seriously you get what you get. Slot is meant to like a fast intense press and one touch play. I think we need to see where it goes as I'm sure he can coach. It's getting the other stuff right for the level and physicality of the league and meeting the ambition with the level of players. It's a huge shift for any manager to come to the prem. Some have done it really well and some have not. Few have had the size of job or expectations that slot has to cope with.
Arne Slot on the positives I think there were a few positive things and, of course, a few things we have to improve. But the positive thing is that we kept a clean sheet. I think we only conceded one big chance and that was somewhere around the last 10 minutes of the game. So we controlled the game really well and in between we had a few good attacks where we created a few good chances and scored a good goal. Those were the positives from this game. On the formation used I think during the season you will see us play with a real striker. But at this moment we have no-one available and then with Dom and Harvey [Elliott] we've got two No.10s, so we put them in the position they will play during the season as well. So that was one of the reasons why we played with a double 10 instead of with a striker. That is maybe out of necessity. But for the rest of the style of play with trying to build up from the back, that is our style – to control the game, to not concede constant counter-attacks. That will hopefully be our style during the season. There are also, of course, many things we can improve but that's normal after two weeks. On the high press I think we pressed them higher than they did us. We won the ball back a lot of times high in their half. But there were moments when they pressed us high. We played through their press a few times really good, so the goal was an example of that and our biggest chance of the second half was an example of that as well. But I also saw moments where we lost the ball too simple or we made the wrong choices, and I think that's normal after two weeks of trying to implement more control from the back. So, we take some positives and we take some things which we can and have to improve, especially with the likes of Arsenal and Man United coming up. On the performances of Bajcetic and Nyoni I think you have to take into account with Stefan that he was out for a year, one-and-a-half years almost. So if a young player is out for that long, you have to give him some time. But I saw today already a few good moments from him and also a few moments where he got caught because he acted a bit too slow. But I think that's normal if you've been out for such a long time [and] then you need rhythm, you need game time to grow even further. But I think he showed some good moments during the half-hour that he played. I think Trey did really well today but it was only an hour. Like I said, he did well. He was one of the reasons why we scored the goal, because he turned really quickly and [played] a spot-on pass in between the lines. And he was also involved in the biggest chance in the second half. So he did well. But he's just turned 17 and his body has to grow, and we are really careful with him. So he doesn't join every session and sometimes he goes out a bit earlier because he only turned 17 and you can see his quality but you can also see his body still needs some time to grow to play at Premier League level. But he showed some interesting things today. On Liverpool fans If I'm coaching my team I'm only focused on 11 players. What can they do? What can they do better? Which positions they have to take, which choices do they make? So I'm not so aware constantly of coaching Liverpool or the amount of fans that are there. My focus is mainly on the team and where I can help them during the game or during half-time. Of course it's a nice experience to play in front of the fans, because they were there with a lot of people even here in the USA. Like I said, mainly focused on the players and not as much focused on the fans, but it's nice to play in front of them and to have them here as well.
I have mate ,the fella comes across really well and if a large part of his remit is to put an end to how open we were to counters last season ,then I'm all in. As a Kopite I cant tell you just how galling that was last season ,being susceptible to every ball over the top or through the middle as soon as our offensive play stuttered. I honestly think the club has chosen the best candidate to engender a progressive transition away from Klopp and I'm delighted that there's a similar kind of steel to Slot's demeanor. I don't think he's going to allow himself to be anybody's fool if players aren't cutting it.
Here's hoping. Something was off last season so if he can keep the forwards scoring while fixing that defense we will fly.
I just seen a snippet of Harvey Elliot talking on SSN and he described Slot's style of play as 'very elegant' and 'very nice' and a lot different to that of Klopp. It's good that the players are happy and buying into everything that the manager's selling it benefits everyone associated with the club. But some of the comments do seem a little bit premature they've only had a couple weeks training and one proper pre-season game under belts (Not including the behind closed doors one). I'd rather wait until a ball is kicked in anger before making my own mind up and even then i'll still have reservations on the likelihood Slot will get a honeymoon period before things level out then we'll get a better indication on what's what.
As long as the objective for us is to score goals and not just pass it around to death then all is well. Let's wait and see.
Not what I meant. The style is different. They are commenting about a lot of passing. I am hoping they don't mean passing it to death and not actually going for the jugular. The thing about Klopp's era was fast breaks and goals to the point there side sat deep and just try to make us play in front. I don't know what the style they are alluding to but it can't be to pass it for the sake of passing it.
I'm loving the impression he's giving us that he's going to be a hard man to please. I think we're going to see a manager who enjoys mapping out the finest details of what he needs from a player to a ridiculously meticulous extent, until said player gives him exactly what he wants.
top four - I think he'd be forgiven for missing out if by 1-4 points, but really he is inheriting a very good squad and despite many rival 'fans' making a big deal out of players in last year of contract (Salah, Van Dijk and Alexander-Arnold?) it is a squad lots of clubs will need to go some to get close to knockouts in Champions League - think you have to be pretty ordinary not to progress, I know some blame injuries and "group of death" but really you need to win 3+ games, sometimes only 2, and you play 3 at home....... I'd say QFs is the benchmark, that's when you get down to the real nitty gritty domestic cups - would place ZERO measure of good/bad season on domestic cups, sure Liverpool should beat most sides in the top four divisions but teams play well and you can't control the draw in spite of conspiracists who claim it is fixed got to be minimum top 5-6, if not top 4 then really needs to progress in the Champions League at least to L16 and domestic cups I'd treat as an "interesting" diversion but wouldn't judge him badly if exited at say R3 and R4 in domestic cups, or go all gooey over him winning one or t'other like some manc fans seem to over Ten Bob for winning cups two seasons in a row - ultimate measure of success/fail these days is league and Europe whether (some) fans like it or not, you are unlikely to progress and establish yourself winning the odd cup and doing FA in the league of course for the likes of villa winning a trophy, even if tinpot, might edge it because for them that's rare, for mancs it is setting the bar below sea level!
I think Slot has one of the more challenging and difficult jobs we've seen at the big six clubs for the last half decade. And it's nowt to do with following Jurgen Klopp but more to do with coming into a club already in an established position. No one would begrudge him having a season to get to grips with the league and potentially dropping out the top 4 but then the sceptics will say that's moving backwards, it's failure. I think 'only' making the top 4 would be totally fine but I also think it shouldn't be the ceiling of their ambition this season.
