When Liverpool were winning games with late goals, top of the Premier League with maximum points, their immediate future promised to develop in two disparate ways: 1) Liverpool would get better and thus start winning games with more comfort, or 2) the late goals would dry up and expose the weaknesses in Liverpool’s performance level. The second of those options has arrived.
The trip to Crystal Palace began a run of five away trips in six games and Liverpool have now lost the first two. Their results across the first 80 minutes of their games this season: 2-2, 2-2, 2-1, 0-0, 0-0, 2-2, 2-1, 1-1, 0-1, 0-1. It all just feels a little flat outside those moments of late drama.
Being top of the Premier League while you iron out your issues is a wonderful luxury and well-earned privilege, but there are niggling question marks that Arne Slot will be working through during the forthcoming international break. They may determine Liverpool’s ability to defend the title.
Too much unfamiliarity
Last season, Liverpool brought one player into their first team squad: Federico Chiesa. He played only 104 league minutes, starting one game (against Brighton in the penultimate league game when the title was already won). Slot was the surprise factor – his football, his style, his ability to create a prodigious three-man midfield and continue getting the best out of Mohamed Salah.
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This season, pretty much the opposite. Slot no longer has the element of surprise (there is a clear argument that he was a little underestimated by opposition coaches last season) but he does have half a new team to acclimatise.
There’s no question that Liverpool have this the right way round: if they had bought so many new players last summer, and had a new manager, it could easily have caused Slot to sink and struggle to keep his job. But it presents a very different – and very difficult – challenge.
Missing Trent Alexander-Arnold
Losing Alexander-Arnold to Real Madrid caused an angry wave of bitterness, not least because he left without Liverpool receiving a transfer fee, but he also leaves a difficult hole to fill.
Alexander-Arnold’s defensive struggles became a point of contention over the last two years, but he was a plug-in-and-play solution at right-back who could overlap, invert into midfield or stay deeper as the situation demanded.
So far this season, Slot has picked Dominik Szoboszlai as his right-back for three league games, Conor Bradley for two and Jeremie Frimpong for one. Frimpong is the new signing, but it’s hard to see how he and Salah can play in combination without leaving space behind for teams to exploit on the counter attack.
Szoboszlai is absolutely an effective option, but then you lose him from central midfield (where Liverpool didn’t buy a player this summer) and raises questions as to why Frimpong was deemed the appropriate option.
If that wasn’t enough, Milos Kerkez is also struggling to combine his attacking and defensive duties on the other side. We became so used to Alexander-Arnold and Andrew Robertson as two of Liverpool’s elite creators. Now it’s hard to know who is first-choice right-back and Kerkez has created three chances in six matches.
Salah staying wide (and less dangerous)
Salah’s new contract – announced in April – became inevitable after his phenomenal 2024-25: 29 league goals and 18 assists made it arguably the most complete season of his Liverpool career.
So why have Liverpool changed Salah’s role? Last season, his success was predicated on being able to move into central positions, with both the central and left-sided strikers tending to dovetail together. Salah operated more on the right side of the pitch than the right wing.
No longer. Some of this can be put down to Salah’s form, but he’s having roughly the same number of touches and making the same number of passes. His number of shots and his touches in the penalty area have halved and the average distance from goal that each shot is taken from is the highest of his Liverpool career.
The arrival of two central strikers has, for now, turned Salah into more of a winger and that doesn’t make much sense.
Central defensive issues
In their ideal world, Liverpool’s central defensive pairing would be Virgil van Dijk and Marc Guehi. Instead they signed Giovanni Leoni (now injured for a year with a torn ACL) and backed Ibrahima Konate and Van Dijk to be the first-choice pair in three competitions.
Konate is struggling. Slot is asking him to step out into midfield with the ball more, but he’s both failing to make that work and also repeatedly being caught in transition, either slow to react to attacking runs or in the wrong position to start with. Jean-Philippe Mateta bullied him last weekend.
Konate is clearly an excellent defender – and one who is out of contract next summer – but the lack of dependability in central defence may well be playing on the minds of those in front of him and now there is only Joe Gomez in reserve. Liverpool look light on numbers.
Too slow through midfield
Liverpool’s heat map against Crystal Palace was damning.
It contains two dots where the central midfielders would receive possession and play passes, then a massive red block that engulfed the penalty area with precious little action inside it. It looked like an NBA team doing three-pointer practice.
Liverpool are having much more of the ball this season, up from an average of 57.7 per cent in 2024-25 to 64.0 per cent. But remember: possession is simply calculated as the ratio of passes your team makes vs the opposition. Liverpool are making more passes, sure, but they are also taking shots less often, taking their shots from two yards further out on average and are having 20 per cent fewer touches of the ball in the opposition penalty area.
Liverpool are, to be blunt, a little predictable until their moments of late drama. That will change as they get Alexander Isak up to speed and perhaps work Szoboszlai back into a dynamic midfield position. But for now, they are falling into the trap against low blocks of passing the ball from side to side without entering the penalty area enough.
Wirtz not justifying the change of shape
How much of that predictability is down to Florian Wirtz failing to make a difference so far? The German is yet to provide a goal or assist in his eight Premier League and Champions League appearances so far.
At first glance, the numbers are good. Wirtz has created more chances in all competitions than any other Premier League player and is carrying the ball towards goal far more often than Salah. He’s had chances and has had touches in the opposition penalty area.
But therein lies the issue: Wirtz is being given huge licence to roam both centrally and deep – he’s having almost three times as many touches as Salah in the middle third of the pitch. He’s having 50 per cent more touches than Salah in general.
The midfield shape and the patterns of play have been shifted to make Wirtz the critical creative influence, so that when he doesn’t deliver it causes Liverpool to get a little stuck, freezes Salah out a little on the right wing and stymies the service to the centre-forward.
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