Explained: 3 things Arne Slot and Liverpool must address this international break

Liverpool have won seven out of ten games across all competitions this season and currently sit second in the Premier League table, and yet Arne Slot’s star-studded team find themselves barreling towards a crisis.

The crisis has not arrived — not yet — but Liverpool’s current run of three defeats in a row is not something we can let slip by, given how they’ve been performing in the lead-up to this run. New players are struggling to settle, and Slot’s rejig of the formation that worked wonders last season has not really worked thus far, with a number of regulars also looking out of sorts.

Here, we look at the three most pressing issues that Arne Slot must address during this international break, with both league rivals Arsenal and Manchester City showing ominous signs.

Defensive disintegration

Liverpool’s underperformance in the first seven league games this season can be characterised by their disorganised defence. The alarm bells started ringing even in those early victories, as their defence was being pulled from pillar to post, regularly bypassed by any team with the bravery to attack quickly and in numbers.

In their first five victories, Liverpool surrendered two-goal leads on three separate occasions. In their three recent defeats, they were left trailing by the 16th minute.

Besides, Slot’s men have already conceded nine goals in the league — more than half the sides in the division — and are allowing 1.38 expected goals (xG) on average per match. The defensive unit that kept more clean sheets than any other team in the English top flight last season is currently being bypassed with alarming ease.

The arrival of the incredibly attack-minded Jeremie Frimpong and Milos Kerkez has left gaping holes in transition, with the former struggling to establish himself as a regular and the latter having had a disappointing start to life at Merseyside altogether.

Add to that the calamitous defending on display by Ibrahima Konaté this season and an ageing Virgil van Dijk trying to tie it all together, “control” is the last word that comes to mind whenever I’ve watched Liverpool play this season.

Fixing the defence will prove far from straightforward. Personnel and tactical alterations are required to tighten things up. Even then, it’ll be difficult for Liverpool to emulate or even improve upon last season’s success while their defensive structure remains so disordered.

Square pegs in round holes

At first, it seemed that Liverpool’s biggest tactical problem was switching from a 4-3-3 to a 4-2-3-1 formation to accommodate Florian Wirtz as the central creator.

Looking at the unsettled midfield, which has an Alexis Mac Allister who still doesn’t quite seem back to his best after a muscle injury, a Ryan Gravenberch who is playing out of position, and a Dominik Szoboszlai who finds himself deeper to accommodate Wirtz, with both Cody Gakpo and Mohamed Salah struggling out wide, one realises that the manager is still trying to figure out a way to fit in all of his new toys.

And maybe that’s the real problem here: trying too stubbornly to shoehorn pieces that don’t quite fit into the puzzle right away.

That said, in recent games Slot has returned to last season’s midfield trio; he switched back to a 4-3-3 against Chelsea, though many of the problems remained evident. Liverpool’s centre-backs keep getting isolated, and their fullbacks are leaving too much space in transition, while teams are easily bypassing their renowned high press with ease.

So, what has changed? Why isn’t last season’s title-winning centre-back pairing and midfield three that were so effective suddenly not functioning?

The answer is twofold. First, the new fullbacks, Kerkez and Frimpong, are very different from what Andy Robertson and Trent Alexander-Arnold brought to the table. Second, and more importantly, Liverpool’s press has stopped working as it once did. Something similar happened to Jürgen Klopp’s Liverpool during the 2020/21 season, when they finished a distant third to Manchester City after winning the league the season before.

While it’s no secret that Alexander-Arnold has his limitations defensively, his capabilities in the opposition half make him one of the best at what he does. His rapid, accurate 30- and 40-yard passes often released the wide forwards in behind, but his passing in general was central to Liverpool’s build-up play.

Probably even more important, though, was the Englishman’s capacity to invert into midfield and become an additional holding player alongside Gravenberch. His successor, Frimpong, who was a wingback at Bayer Leverkusen, is of a different profile altogether. He runs with the ball rather than passing it, and his natural inclination is to go on the outside, not the inside. Given Salah prefers to cut inside, that may work eventually, but for now Liverpool are missing both the balance Alexander-Arnold brought and his capacity to unleash their front line.

Kerkez, meanwhile, is somewhat more secure than Frimpong, though he too hasn’t had an easy start to the campaign. He is yet to find a stable footing, and getting subbed off twice at half-time this early into the season would have done little to lift his confidence.

One of the main reasons for Liverpool’s failed press this season is the lack of pressing from their front line. Salah, in his defence, asked Slot for more freedom last season and less defensive work, which paid huge dividends as he registered 57 goal contributions across all competitions.

However, unlike Szoboszlai, who provided both defensive protection and work rate off the ball, Wirtz unsurprisingly wants to operate in and around the penalty area where he can contribute with goals and assists, but the advanced positions he occupies leaves Liverpool short when the ball is turned over.

It can’t be denied that Wirtz’s performances have been poorer than expected as he struggles to adapt to life in a new team and country, but it‘s the impact the 22-year-old has on Liverpool’s shape and cohesion that is the major concern. The Reds are not used to having an out-and-out attacking midfielder in their line-up. Accommodating Wirtz without abandoning structural integrity is the puzzle Slot has to solve, and there doesn‘t appear to be an easy fix.

Moreover, the likes of Luis Díaz, Darwin Núñez, and the late Diogo Jota were some of the best pressers Liverpool had last season in the front line. Their off-the-ball work rate and ability to run with the ball at their feet — especially Díaz’s — is proving to be a big miss this season. 

The Mo Salah malaise

Mohamed Salah will always be under more scrutiny than most, especially after landing a new bumper contract last season to add another two years to his stay at Anfield. Evidently, the idea was that keeping Salah and adding star names like Florian Wirtz and Alexander Isak would ensure further domination for the English champions.

It’s still early days, of course, and Liverpool remain second in the league, just one point behind Arsenal, but things aren’t looking great at the moment. At their best in recent years, Liverpool have found a way to get Salah plenty of the ball in dangerous areas, but that is not happening this season.

Whether it’s age or just fullbacks staying tighter to him when he receives the ball, Salah is not dribbling anywhere near as often as usual. Last season, he attempted 3.5 dribbles per 90 with a success rate of 39.3% across all competitions, and he has never averaged fewer than 2.8 dribbles per 90 in a campaign for Liverpool or had a success rate lower than 31.6%. However, after 10 games this season, he is attempting just 1.6 dribbles per 90 with a 20% success rate.

In fact, in the Premier League, Salah has completed just one of 11 attempted dribbles (9.1%); last season, he completed 58 of 137 (42.3%).

This is not entirely his fault. After all, this is a player who recorded 47 goal involvements in the Premier League just last term — a record for a 38-game season in PL history. Rather, it’s the makeup of the team that is having a negative impact on his performances.

It should also be noted that Salah’s creative numbers have not all dipped as much. While he is creating around half a chance fewer per 90 (1.6 compared to 2.1 last season), his expected assists per 90 (0.23 from 0.24) and big chances created per 90 (0.65 from 0.66) are basically the same.

One of the key factors for Salah’s drop in numbers could be down to the absence of his partnership with Trent Alexander-Arnold down the right side.

During the 2024/25 season, both Alexander-Arnold and Salah featured together in 33 league games. In those games, Salah scored 27 goals, averaging 3.5 shots per game, 0.48 non-pen xG, and 10.5 touches in the opposition’s box. In the 12 games in which Alexander-Arnold didn’t play across last season and this one, Salah has scored just four goals — two of which were penalties — and averaged 2.3 shots per game, 0.3 non-pen xG, and 7.2 touches in the opposition’s box.

Despite all the new toys at his disposal, Arne Slot knows he needs Salah at his best to get anywhere near winning a second Premier League title on the bounce. With the competition so tight at the top of the table, he’ll need to find a solution fast before things truly spiral out of control.