Fowler: There’s one thing Arne Slot “can’t say” as Liverpool’s title hopes hang by a thread | OneFootball

Robbie Fowler has claimed that there’s one thing Arne Slot “can’t say” in public, regardless of how unrealistic or insincere it might sound.

Liverpool have it all to do if they’re to retain their Premier League title, with five top-flight defeats from 11 games so far leaving them eight points adrift of leaders Arsenal, and the same number above West Ham in 18th.

Some pundits have already dismissed the Reds as realistic contenders for the trophy in 2025/26, and one of the club’s greatest-ever players believes that a second successive crown would be impossible to achieve without near-perfection from hereon.

Fowler: Liverpool now need to win ‘virtually every game’

Addressing Liverpool’s chances of retaining the title on The Good, The Bad and The Football, Fowler said: “I’ve obviously played the game and I am more of a realist… you have an understanding of the game and the manager will come out and he’ll say all the right things, don’t get me wrong.

“You can’t say, ‘We’ve given up’, because that sounds terrible as an outsider looking in, but you’ve got to have a bit of realism as well. I think history probably tells you there’s probably only two teams who have won the Premier League on the back of six or seven defeats.

“It’ll be hard for Liverpool now. If they are going to win the league, they’ve got to win virtually every game… they can’t even draw games, they have got to win them.

“I think they’re out of the title [race]. I don’t think they come out and say that they are in it, but they’ve got to have that professionalism where you still need to kick on and try and get the points.”

(Photo by Carl Recine/Getty Images)

Liverpool just need to rebuild momentum in the short-term

Fowler is right – it’d send out a terrible message if Slot were to publicly concede the Premier League title this early. After all, there’s more than two-thirds of the season still to play, so the eight-point gap to Arsenal is more than retreivable.

However, as ‘God’ has said, Liverpool’s margin for error is minimal, considering that it’d probably require a points tally in the high 80s to finish first, and the mathematical maximum they can now reach is 99.

By that projection, they can realistically only afford to drop 10-12 more points from their 27 remaining matches if they’re to retain their crown in 2025/26, which equates to a minimum of 20-21 more wins.

Once the Premier League returns after the international break, Slot must simply focus on beating Nottingham Forest and trying to regain some bit of momentum coming up towards the festive period, rather than being preoccupied with the points gap to Arsenal.

Liverpool aren’t in a position to overly worry about what other teams might do when they’ve so many issues of their own to resolve. As Fowler says, they just need to keep a high level of ‘professionalism’ and build some confidence again, in the hope that it could propel them into a better position than where they currently find themselves.

You can watch Slot’s full post-Man City press conference via Empire of the Kop on YouTube: