Why Liverpool could face the same issue as last season - with a defining week ahead

In the first half of the season for Liverpool, it became a little bit of a running joke among supporters how often Arne Slot mentioned the 1-0 defeat to Nottingham Forest. Given that it was the only time Slot suffered a league defeat in 2024, the result gnawed away at him and he often cited it in press conferences.

And while it may only be one game since the last-gasp 2-2 draw at Everton, the two press conferences since that final Merseyside derby at Goodison Park have been dominated by Slot’s thoughts and frustrations from the dropped points, even when assessing the 2-1 home win over Wolverhampton Wanderers on Sunday.

Seven times the Reds’ head coach mentioned the Everton game the previous Wednesday during his post-Wolves press conference, admitting that the manner of the 98th-minute equaliser seemed to be in his and his players’ minds as Wolves halved the deficit at Anfield. 

Liverpool weren't at their best against Wolves, breaking a 20-year drought for a half of football

“I think that [the late equaliser from Everton] was in our heads a bit and that's also why we, as a team, were so furious on Wednesday,” said Slot. 

“All the events that happened on Wednesday evening, it's not only working hard, what did it do to us mentally as well, those last eight minutes of injury time? I can even tell you what it did to me mentally, let alone what it did to these players that had to run so much!”

Slot’s side certainly didn’t produce anything close to their best against a Wolves side that came out in the second half and gave a much-improved performance. Indeed, Liverpool didn’t manage a single shot in the second half - the first time they’ve failed to do so in a half of a Premier League game in over 20 years. 

“We got worse and worse,” summed up Slot in a typically frank interview with Match of the Day. “We were so close on Wednesday, this time we did survive.” (Yes, another reference to the Everton draw.)

That Liverpool survived the scare and got the three points to restore their seven-point lead at the top of the Premier League will be a psychological boost that they need ahead of a defining week for the Merseysiders.

Winning ugly is always said to be a ‘sign of champions’ but there are also only so many times you can do so and ‘get away with it’ and that’s where Liverpool came unstuck last season. The Reds are only three points better off than at this stage last season under Jurgen Klopp and were in fact still top of the league as late as matchday 30. It was there that the tiredness set in, the physical and mental fatigue - particularly from the damaging draw at Manchester United in early April.

Everton draw cannot become a repeat issue from Jurgen Klopp’s last season

Slot is well aware of Liverpool’s past, mentioning the struggles of last season several times, and perhaps he even feared that the Everton draw could prove as damaging as the 2-2 at Old Trafford did last season.

The Liverpool boss, then, was keen to point out that his players are not physically tired - and they shouldn’t be, given that most of the starting XI had sat out the FA Cup defeat at Plymouth a week before and their Champions League game at PSV a fortnight ago.  

“They are able to play every three days in the highest intensity, but you have to take the mental part of the game into the occasion as well,” the Dutchman assessed.  

“These players are able to be all on it again on Wednesday and Sunday as well,” said Slot, whose side travel to Aston Villa on Wednesday night, then to the Etihad to face a returning-to-form Manchester City side - albeit a City side that play in Madrid in midweek also.  

It could be a defining week for whether this Liverpool side can hold its nerve and lift the club’s 20th league title.