There has been widespread debate over Arne Slot‘s lack of rotation following an intense international break, but he says the defeat to Forest had little to do with his lack of changes.
It was no secret that the intensity would pick up immediately after the international break for Liverpool with seven games in the space of just 22 days.
Having named a consistent starting lineup in his first three Premier League games that heavily featured players who regularly feature for their country, there was a consensus rotation was needed.
It did not come against Nottingham Forest, and it meant seven of the XI played maximum minutes for their country during the break before being thrown straight back into domestic action.
The intensity of the calendar is not new to supporters or Liverpool’s players, but Slot still has yet to embrace what is a key ingredient for success following his move from Feyenoord.
“If rotation would be the reason why you don’t win a game, then it probably wouldn’t be the first game I lost in 2024 last Saturday because at Feyenoord, we didn’t rotate a lot,” he explained.
“For me, and everyone can have their own opinion, it is too simple to put this loss on rotation because I think too many players didn’t reach their normal level.
“That is not only the ones that started but also the ones that came in [off the bench.]
“For me, it had a lot to do with the playing style of the opponent, who made it really difficult for us. But, in the end, if you didn’t win, you try to look at as many arguments as you can find.
“I also ask myself the question, does it have to do with the things you said? But I prefer to look back at the game and see what we did well or didn’t do well.
“I think we could’ve done a lot of things much better that was not related to rotation. We will never know if I rotated three or four players if we would have won that.”
That is correct, we won’t. Consistency in team selection is to be admired and is often key to success, but utilising the depth of the squad at the right times is a lesson he can learn from Jurgen Klopp.
Slot continued: “I think it was the day before the [Forest] press conference, someone said to me ’10 of your players have started for the national team’, so which ones were completely rested then?
“Now I can do something about the rotation in the upcoming games because they are all with me. But before that, they were with the national team, and almost all of them played two x 90 minutes.
“I think they were prepared for that, we tried to prepare them for that and, for me, this loss didn’t have to do with rotation, but more to do with the opponent and too many players not bringing what they can bring.”
Surely we can expect changes at the San Siro though, right?
