Arne Slot hasn’t just been adapting Liverpool’s on-field routines, he has also implemented a routine change that Pep Guardiola made at Barcelona and Man City.
Change at football clubs is natural, especially when a new coach arrives. In Slot’s case, thankfully he isn’t uprooting a culture in a struggle to turn around the fortunes of his team.
Instead, his changes can be seen more as developments or modifications of what went before.
One routine Jurgen Klopp‘s Liverpool followed was to stay at a hotel in Liverpool the night before home matches. At first, this was at the Hope Street Hotel before latterly moving to the Titanic Hotel.
Slot has elected not to follow this routine, though, and Liverpool’s players slept at home the night before their Anfield win against Brentford and also the home friendly vs. Sevilla.
The squad then met on the morning of the match for their team meeting before taking the team bus to Anfield.
Taking inspiration from Guardiola?
It is a routine that seems set to stay and is one Pep Guardiola also implemented during his time at Barcelona and Man City.
The Spaniard once said: “People don’t spend the day before they go to work locked up in a hotel.
“We just try to make things the same for them. If they don’t rest, they’re not looking after themselves and that means they’ll play worse and lose their jobs.
“I judge my players on the work they do, not on their private lives. I’m not a policeman.
“I’m in bed at 10 o’clock and I’ve got no urge to go and check up on my players. That’s why I’d rather have them at home and not cooped up in a hotel with nothing to do. We’re just trying to use common sense.”
Legendary Barcelona midfielder Xavi even described how letting the players stay at home the night before games had a liberating effect on the team.
In Guillem Balague’s biography, Pep Guardiola: Another Way Of Winning, Xavi said: “For me, two of the most important novelties were the move to the training ground and getting rid of the hotel meetings.”
While Klopp will have had good reason to stay in a hotel with the team before games, Guardiola’s explanation also makes a lot of sense.
This season, Liverpool will play a minimum of 24 home games, meaning at least 24 extra nights at home with family, which is a significant number in the busy life of a player who has European and international football also on their plate.
Ahead of a packed campaign, having happy players with a good home life can be no bad thing for Slot.
