In a season full of setbacks, Liverpool manager Arne Slot has demonstrated he’s no Premier League wartime consigliere…
I missed the first eight minutes, which is to say I missed the bit where Liverpool were competitive at 0-0. The narrative of the game was written before I sat down.
Bob Paisley’s only disappointment with Liverpool legend Ray Kennedy was that he was a slow starter. ‘I want you to start when all the others do,’ he would tell him.
There was good reason for Ray’s early lethargy. I can’t begin to explain the reason for Liverpool’s.
So many games are determined on confidence and momentum. Look at the Palace game. 2-0 up and the issues temporarily forgotten. Go a goal down, however, and we might as well go home. No fight, no show, no pride in where we are and what we’re doing. No plan either. As Johno said on The Ratings, you need a plan. Ours seemed to be just to turn up and hope.
You can go a goal down. That happens. Someone has to score and if it’s not you, you put a plan together to sort it out. The first thing to do is to not give a second goal away. Once again, Liverpool weren’t listening. 2-0 and everyone just wants to get off the pitch and get to work on the ‘We go again’ press release for next week. Beaten again by their own meekness.
Neil used the word ‘mitigation’ a few times in his post-match review and it’s important to accept that there are other factors for Liverpool’s awful season. None of what you’d suppose are our preferred front three of Ekitike, Isak and Salah are available so where are the goals coming from?
What’s the manager supposed to do? Cody can be a number nine of sorts but not one you’d start at Old Trafford in May. Equally, we don’t have a fit right-back apart from the one who’s now a right-sided forward, but isn’t, so instead we’re playing arguably our best protective central midfielder there. I still wouldn’t recognise our goalkeeper if I shared a cab with him.
But that mitigation only carries you so far. Alexis Mac Allister and Florian Wirtz both finished the game. They get 95 minutes.
It’s easy to shine a torch at Mac Allister and I enjoyed his occasional drives forward when he had space, but his legs have clearly gone. His clearance for the third goal was Sunday League level at best, but he’s playing centre-mid for Liverpool at Old Trafford. I think that might be the last time he does that. Nevertheless, he gets 95 minutes.
Elsewhere?
A few weeks ago, I was given a free ticket to see the Happy Mondays. I’ve never been a huge fan but like the odd song so it wasn’t a chore. On they came and kicked off with Kinky Afro. Then came Bez, their dancer, whose sole role is to gyrate around Shaun Ryder and shake the odd maraca. That’s his job. To come on, tell everyone to have a good time, have a dance and get off again. He doesn’t even have to learn the songs. Not for the first time I wondered if he’s needed at rehearsals.
It was great to see him as he’s entertaining, despite not really contributing anything to the songs.
See Florian Wirtz.
A flick here or there, the odd bit of skill, true, but ultimately, he’s just shaking maracas in the Liverpool midfield at Old Trafford against Manchester United. He too gets the full 95 minutes.
Mitigation is significant. The bench has few options; so much so that we’re asking a 17-year old kid to get us out of trouble at Old Trafford. Arne Slot has been dealt an awful hand, but my God, he does himself no favours.
One final analogy. Promise. In ‘The Godfather’ Tom Hagen, the Don’s advisor, is sacked when Michael takes over from his dad as head of the family. Tom’s stunned and asks why.
“You’re not a wartime consiglieri, Tom,” his brother replies. “Things might get rough with the move we’re trying.”
One thing has become clear this season. Arne Slot is a league winning manager and an exceptional manager, but what he’s not is a wartime consiglieri. That’s fine up to a point, but in the Premier League and with the game as it is, it’s almost always wartime.
The whispers around the club say he’ll be here next season, but I have my doubts. There are people who openly despise him and people who want him to stay, but there’s an increasing number of people who just want something to build on and doubt if he can do it from here.
I want him to stay as I hate it when the club has to start again, but I wonder how he can go to Old Trafford with no Plan A and watch Liverpool capitulate in Manchester for the third time this season.
This is a team desperate for the season to end. They can’t think like that as there’s still Champions League qualification to sort, but if Sunday’s anything to go by, they’ll do just that.
There has to be a change though. That much is clear. You can’t go a goal down and hope the opposition gives you gifts.
It’s always wartime in the Premier League and if you have no skill in crisis management then there’s only one way this is going to end. I wish it were otherwise.
