Frustrated by your rival clubs’ apparent efforts to drain your victory of emotion and spectacle? No problem: just bring it yourself. Liverpool sealed their 20th Premier League title with a 5-1 demolition of Tottenham, crowning a triumphant campaign with the flourish a raucous Anfield had demanded.
Seldom can a match have begun amid such riotous pre-celebrations, the Liverpool bus emerging through thick clouds of red smoke as though Hell had elected a new Pope. Having been denied the chance to properly acclaim their last title victory in 2020, Liverpool fans were determined to make this one count.
The club legends packing the directors’ box saw a minor character in Liverpool’s history score the opening goal for the away side, but Dominic Solanke was really just helping to get the party going. For the rest of the afternoon Spurs played their appointed sacrificial role with commendable tact and sensitivity. Within 20 minutes Liverpool had replied with three goals of their own through Luis Diaz, Alexis MacAllister and Cody Gakpo, and the title celebrations could resume at full roar.
Arne Slot has produced the most impressive season from a debut Premier League manager since Jose Mourinho won his first league with Chelsea 20 years ago. Unlike Mourinho, Slot has not surfed to the title on an unstoppable tidal wave of Russian oligarch cash. Instead he has made the difference with small but significant football decisions.
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He was left a decent squad by Jürgen Klopp, but not one that looked likely to run away with the title. There was a long-standing weakness in defensive midfield, a problem Liverpool began this season trying and failing to solve, when their number one transfer target, Martin Zubimendi, rejected the chance to join them from Real Sociedad.
Slot came up with an instant solution using the players he already had. Nobody expected Ryan Gravenberch to be the best deep-lying midfielder in the Premier League over the first five months of the season, but that is exactly what happened. By the time Gravenberch’s performances started to dip in January, Liverpool had already built up a decisive lead. Even if Klopp had recognised this potential in Gravenberch, he never managed to create the tactical structure that would allow the player to show it.
Slot also saw how he could get more out of Cody Gakpo and Luis Diaz than his predecessor had managed. Klopp preferred to use the taller, stronger Gakpo in the middle of the attack with Diaz playing from the left. But Slot saw that Gakpo was more comfortable and effective at left wing, while Diaz had the flexibility to link the attack from the centre. Diaz, Gakpo and Diogo Jota tended to fill the left and central attacking positions, while Klopp’s biggest recruitment mistake, Darwin Nuñez, was largely sidelined.
And then there is Mohamed Salah, who, remember, had largely fallen out with Klopp by the end of last season. His performances seemed locked into a gentle but inevitable decline. Instead he has produced 28 goals and 18 assists in the league, adding up to one of the all-time greatest individual seasons. He is a certainty to win the PFA Player of the Year award, becoming the first-ever three-time winner.
Salah’s renewed effectiveness owes much to Slot finding ways to allow him to lurk higher up the pitch without having to do a lot of defensive running. The double-pivot midfield makes Liverpool less vulnerable to counters and the more conventional full back gives Salah more defensive cover than he had been getting from Trent Alexander-Arnold in his roaming hybrid role.
The ways in which Slot has improved upon Klopp’s team gives those of us who are dazzled by charisma and crave hero-driven narrative something to think about. Maybe Slot, rather than Klopp, is the model of the modern football coach: collaborative, egoless, technically-minded. Let the players be the stars.
He’s made it look easy. And in some respects it really has been easy, or at least easier than Slot or anyone else could have reasonably anticipated. It’s not a criticism of Liverpool to notice that the two teams who were generally expected to fight it out for the title simply didn’t show up.
Arsenal and Manchester City can at least say they contested the single most consequential match of the Premier League season. The 2-2 draw in Manchester on September 22nd conditioned how the rest of the campaign would go for both teams.
For City, the game cost them Rodri, who suffered a season-ending cruciate ligament injury in the 21st minute. The utter collapse of their team from the end of October onwards is what this season will likely be remembered for.
For Arsenal, that game established certain recurring pathologies that have plagued their season. They were leading 2-1 when they had Leandro Trossard sent off for kicking the ball away in first-half injury time - the second Arsenal player to be sent off for that offence in a few weeks. They would eventually amass five red cards in a spectacularly ill-disciplined campaign. One or two red cards can be blamed on refereeing error. Five is self-sabotage.
Arsenal also conceded a 98th-minute set-piece equaliser that day, which was in keeping with two other negative patterns: weakness at defensive set-pieces, and the inability to hold on to leads. They have given up a winning position in nine matches this season, more than any Premier League side since Spurs in 2007-08.
They tend to start games well and they have the best first-half record in the division. But Mikel Arteta has been less adept than Slot at responding to the unexpected situations that arise in matches, and coming up with the right answers. Liverpool rank only fourth in first-half performances, but have by far the best record in second-half play, 22 points better than second-placed Manchester City.
Slot is yet to demonstrate the showmanship of a Klopp or a Mourinho or even an Arteta, but it’s clear he has a pretty good grasp of what is going on out on the pitch.
Next year will bring new challenges. The rivals might even turn up. But Liverpool couldn’t be in better hands.
