Inside Liverpool's Title Win: Slot's Tactics and Salah's Brilliance

Yahoo

15-05-2025

Liverpool are the 2024/25 EPL Champions. And it wasn't close.
So how did we get here? How did this happen? This was supposed to be a two-horse race between Arsenal and Manchester City, just as it has been for the last two seasons. There was no reason to suspect any other outcome. Under Klopp, Liverpool's 2023/24 season had spluttered out.
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Much of the credit has to go to Liverpool's sporting director who identified Arne Slot as the right man to lead the club post-Klopp. Said Hughes, "Everything pointed towards a man that could handle that big club mentality, you have to not just manage the team but you have to manage expectations. You have to be calm about managing this club."
Liverpool didn't buy a single player of note in the summer. This was supposed to be a transition season, a chance for Slot to assess his squad.
And assess his squad he did. And it turned out, with some crucial tweaks along the way – that his squad was simply better than everyone else's in almost every department. If the squad is Klopp's great legacy then getting the best out of them could be the start of Slot's. It's the squad wot won it...
Injury in goal? No problem; we have the best reserve goalkeeper in England in Caoimhin Kelleher. Trent gets injured? Fine; we have the exciting prospect Connor Bradley stepping up. And so on. Life becomes easier when your back-ups are Jones, Endo, Elliot, Gakpo, Jota, Quansah, Gomez, Darwin, players who have countless international caps between them.
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Liverpool's deep bench and Slot's masterful substitutions has won them countless games this season. Whether it's been throwing on Endo as 'the closer' to help protect a lead and see out a game. Or bringing on Jota to score a vital goal at just the right time – sometimes even with his first touch.
Slot also has a highly flexible midfield with players who can play in many positions. It's allowed him to rotate the engine room brilliantly – mainly perming three out of the irrepressible Alexis Mac Allister, the reinvented Ryan Gravenberch, the vastly improved Dominik Szoboszlaior the tidy and effective Curtis Jones. In particular, Slot's conversion of Gravenberch's role – turning him from an also ran to a vital cog – has to be the tactical move of the season.
Likewise he can rotate up front between Diaz, Gakpo, Jota and Núñez, which has a dual purpose of keeping legs fresh and attackers hungry. Diaz and Gakpo's goal contributions have been crucial this season.
The Egyptian King
And then there's Salah. A player who seemed on a mission from the get-go to show Liverpool how mad they would be not to renew his contract. We've probably all seen the statistics but they are worth repeating. Liverpool have scored 75 goals in the EPL this season. Salah has been involved in 45 of them with 27 goals and 18 assists. There are 5 games left. Three more and he will break the EPL record.
Two other players deserve honorable mention. The goalkeeper Alisson and club captain Van Dijk. They are the best in the world and a huge reason Liverpool have won so many of those scrappy 2-1 games, the kind of games that Arsenal have been drawing all season.
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Of course luck plays a part too. Liverpool's leading rivals Manchester City and Arsenal suffered key injuries at just the wrong time – to Rodri and Saka respectively. But overall Liverpool had better depth and were able to rotate better to keep themselves fresher and fitter for the long haul of the EPL while (mostly) maintaining strong performances in Europe and the cups. The exception of course was Slot's over-rotation in the FA Cup, resulting in a shocking defeat against lowly Plymouth.
He'll learn from his mistakes. He's clearly a thoughtful guy….but with a ruthless streak. On the very first game of the season away at Ipswich, Liverpool struggled in a goalless first half. Slot had no hesitation in yanking off the young defender Jarell Quansah and replacing him with Ibrahim Konate. It was a brutal message to his team. I'm the boss now. There is a required standard to play for Liverpool Football Club. Meet that standard or else. Liverpool went on to win the game 2-0, and the rest is a record equaling 20th League title for Liverpool.
Related: After Klopp, Slot is the real "normal one"