Arend Martijn Slot, known professionally as Arne Slot, has entered his name into the Liverpool hall of fame in just his first season.
The former Feyenoord Rotterdam manager replaced Jürgen Klopp, who took nine years to make Liverpool competitive after years of obsolescence in the grand scheme of things as far as English top-flight football was concerned. He was expected to take some time to understand the terrain of English football, but he shocked the world and all of England by usurping Manchester City, who were coming into the 2024/25 season on the back of four straight Premier League title wins, to claim the 2025/26 title with Liverpool.
He lifted the trophy in front of the Liverpool fans, who chanted his name and showered him with praise for a wonderful first season. After the celebrations, he spoke to the media on what this debut meant to him and gave a glimpse into the coming season.
Reflecting on a historic triumph
“Another special day,” he began. “Less pressure than four weeks ago, of course, when we had to win the game to get those celebrations. Now we knew we would get them. The energy in the stadium, how loud the fans were, the way the game ended in the last half-hour, going down to 10 men and then seeing such a great reaction from the players and the fans which led to, in my opinion, a deserved goal – we deserved to go 1-1. These players and these fans hate losing, don’t want to lose and that’s what we showed again today.
“Hopefully that appetite [for success next season] will be big but we will see this when pre-season starts and when we start again. A few of them have already shown that they can win multiple times. I’m talking about the ones that have won the league and the Champions League here before and these are also the players that just keep on performing year after year after year, even if they don’t win it.
Looking ahead: Challenges and ambitions
“A few of them now won the league for the first time and they have to show that they have the same mentality as the ones that have won it here before. I’m looking forward to being part of that. We know it’s going to be tough again. It was already very tough this season. It’s going be probably just as tough or even tougher next season because the club that we’ve competed with this season have in every window always invested a lot of money and they’re probably going to do so this summer as well.
“We did things differently last season. I don’t think it has been said a lot but maybe I’m completely wrong because the one that told me maybe lied to me, but he said to me that since Alex Ferguson won the league, the last time he won the league, not a team has had so many academy minutes as our academy players had this season. So that’s been really special. Apart from signing Federico Chiesa last summer, we didn’t do a lot, and that makes it maybe even more special to win it this season. Now we will see if the team needs. We can do things better already by ourselves without adding any players. But if we can then we will definitely do so.”
