All Aboard the Slot Express

[jozza800]

Not many - Are you following the point Jozza? Klopp needed players to take risks - players to make up for a smaller squad. A lack of genuine world class quality in midfield.

but please explain what the great man said. Go sit in a corner and argue with yourself, If you don’t know - you don’t know… But Jurgen DID and here are HIS words on the matter.



"We cannot be the best team in Europe because Manchester City are the best team in the world — and that is the same planet, I’ve heard. There are a lot of good teams out there and you have to prove that constantly."

Jurgen Klopp September 2019

"We are not the best team in the world. We are a very good team that was in the right moment... Manchester City is an outstanding team. We were the best team in the moments we played them, but overall, they are probably the best team in the world."

Jurgen Klopp July 2020

Both you and Klopp have answered your own question.

City absolutely had the better squad, and is the reason that they beat us over a league season more often than not, but i'd argue all day about the first XI. Which is why we beat them so often in matches.

That XI must have been pretty phenomenal to compete the way they did for that period of time. Klopp did his magic but he needed a special group of players to do it.

[Steveo]

Anyway - I simply suggested that we were never the best - even at our peak under Klopp… and the man himself is in the record making that very point…

BUT this is all a distraction from the teal topic.

Theres loads Slot could have done, but he's carried himself fairly well all things considered.

I think he'll be gone in the summer. It’s just gotten that sour and flat, and Alonso is expected.

let’s not allow a “misunderstanding” to get in the way of the topic…. Let’s get back to this… “he’s carried himself fairly well” 😜

I mean what does that even mean..?

[Steveo]

Both you and Klopp have answered your own question.

City absolutely had the better squad, and is the reason that they beat us over a league season more often than not, but i'd argue all day about the first XI. Which is why we beat them so often in matches.

That XI must have been pretty phenomenal to compete the way they did for that period of time. Klopp did his magic but he needed a special group of players to do it.

And they were - with the cost being Boom & Bust - because Jozza - they had to work twice as hard. Or had you forgotten?

And who would or could argue with that.? Special yes - but a team far more than the sum of its parts.

I know you don’t like to hear it - but it is the simple truth

[Steveo]

It takes a special individual to get an Oxlade Chamberlain to turn down more money in London and head to Liverpool for less. £60,000 a week less.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/41098529

This kind of “special” is where a few folks get confused

[CCTV]

Trying to use Klopp quotes to ditch Robbo, Mane & Salah out of a combined best 11.

“He was a headache. Salah, Robertson, all these players deserve my huge respect.”

That was peps recent quote after Salahs departure was announced.

Salah is the only RWF in the top 10 list for goals and assists per minute this century.

Neymar the only other wide forward in the top 10.
The rest Messi, Mbappe, Halaand, Ronny, Lewandoswki, Suarez, Zlatan & Kane.

As said, Robbo, VVD, Alisson, Mane & Salah are the best in their position.
People can argue against Trent with Walker/Cancelo if they like.

[Steveo]

Klopp’s quotes are Klopp’s quotes. They were made because he was well aware that - as a team - Cjty were the best around. The number of titles - points and trophies attest to this fact.

Nobody is debating if Kyle Walker is better than Trent. He isn’t and never was - not in his class in fact.

I was simply highlighting the fact that Klopp even at our peak under him / never had the best team.. TEAM… And he did not - and he is on the record saying it multiple times. What he built was

Klopp didn't buy a finished product - he bought ingredients... He took a failed Chelsea winger - a relegated Scottish fullback - and an unwanted Newcastle mid... and he turned them into “Heavy Metal"

Pep was always about Selection - Klopp about Evolution... Pep buys the best - but Klopp builds the best… and that is why his team was always greater than the sum of its parts.

- The “special” players are ONLY “special” players under Jurgen Klopp.

[Steveo]

The entire point was to highlight that another manager EVEN with hundreds of millions on top thrown down - in one summer - cannot build that mentality and togetherness that Klopp did.

The spend - out of all character - and itself a testimony to the blind panic last summer. They knew that Klopp’s players had won Klopp another title. Zero changes in personnel - (save Chiesa on the bench) and a few subtle tweaks.. Made good on his Klopp 2.0 side in their second season. And they now knew they had to do everything in their power to try and make it look like continuity - when it was anything but. To desperately make it look like like FSG were capable of doing the same without Klopp and inside this model.

Here is the breakdown of the Klopp miracle worker - the stuff no tactical genius or checkbook manager would have even dreamed of attempting.

He took a skinny kid from the academy - ignored every safe veteran - and handed him the keys to the engine room...from the right-back slot! He didn't just see a prospect but a revolution... and that was before the rest of the world even knew his name.

He convinced a London star like Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain to walk away from a £60,000-a-week pay rise at Arsenal - for the move north to L4 - work twice as hard - and play for a hug and a vision. That's that’s not a transfer - that’s a spiritual recruitment.



He took a Chelsea flop in Mo Salah - a winger who had failed the Premier League test - and polished him until he became the Egyptian King - the GOAT of the modern era who broke every record in the book.

He even convinced his best player at the time - Sadio Mane - to vacate his favourite side of the pitch and move to the left just to accommodate Salah - and still made him even better in the process.

Took "Gok Wan lookalike" Bobby Firmino - a player with a questionable scoring record - and turned him into the most unique false nine the world has ever seen - the heartbeat of the team who defended like a beast and assisted like a magician.

He took "Bog Ordinary" Jordan Henderson - a man the club once tried to swap for Clint Dempsey - and forged him into a UCL and Premier League winning captain - he gave a workhorse the belief of a thoroughbred.

Took Mr. Floppy Matip on a free - and turned him into a world-class ball-carrier (when he was fit) - made Joe Gomez look like a veteran at 20 and even turned Dejan Lovren into a Champions League finalist.

He went to a relegated Hull City - found Andy Robertson - and told him he was the best left-back in Europe until it actually became a fact. He took a City reject in James Milner - a man supposedly in the twilight of his career - and turned him into the Mentality King who was still winning lactate tests at 37. He even managed so well that Origi stayed sweet on loand or on the bench... for years - just to be unleashed as a Legend who only scored goals that broke the internet.

No other manager in history could have taken that specific group of humans and made them believe they were Mentality Monsters until the rest of the world was terrified of them.


And this is why for most of the season I have given 'The Slot Express' an easy ride. When others were calling for his head.. I was focussed mostly on H'edwards. Because I was well aware that Slot had a massive amount to contend with last summer. The tragic loss of Jota - cannot be overstated. He also lost Diaz who I believe he tried everything to keep.

But the reality is that even after being left with probably the best coached and managed squad of players out there... With a mentality that no other squad comes close to.. Capable of taking well over 80 points - even while coping with an injury crisis and bedding in an entirely new midfield... inside of a single year - the signs were there...and they have manifested to a huge degree this season.