Arne Slot doubles down on bizarre stance over rarely-seen Liverpool gem who dazzled Jurgen Klopp | OneFootball

Arne Slot has doubled down on his steadfast refusal to consider picking Calvin Ramsay in Liverpool’s starting XI despite the selection crisis at right-back.

The 22-year-old is the only natural senior option in that area of the pitch currently available to the Reds amid the injuries to Jeremie Frimpong and Conor Bradley, but his solitary first-team appearance this season came in the Carabao Cup defeat to Crystal Palace in October.

Joe Gomez remains touch-and-go as to whether or not he’ll be fit to start against Sunderland on Wednesday, while Dominik Szoboszlai (who’s deputised at right-back of late) is suspended for that game after his red card at the weekend.

Slot undermines Ramsay in public yet again

Slot ruffled feathers last month when openly declaring his belief that he has ‘better options’ in that position than Ramsay, and during his pre-match press conference on Tuesday morning, he again undermined the player.

When asked about the Scottish defender, the 47-yer-old said (via Liverpool Echo): “In general if you don’t win a game, the players who aren’t playing become the best players in the squad. That’s the same everywhere in the world.

“This is an example of that as well. I just want to protect all my players. I’ve chosen other players until now and that’s also what I’m going to do tomorrow.”

(Photo by Dan Istitene/Getty Images)

No justification for Slot’s public intransigence about Ramsay

It beggars belief why Slot is so stubbornly refusing to even consider Ramsay as a possible starter, given the frightening sparsity of right-back options currently available to Liverpool.

We get that the head coach knows his players better than anyone and that it would be a gamble to throw a youngster who’s made just three senior appearances for the Reds into a potential bear pit at the Stadium of Light on Wednesday.

However, we don’t understand why the head coach is being so publicly intransigent about the 22-year-old at a time when he ought to be grateful for any player who can fill what’s been a hugely problematic position in the team this season.

Slot’s public undermining of Ramsay is in stark contrast to how Jurgen Klopp talked him up during his reign at Anfield, with the German proclaiming him to be an ‘exceptional talent‘.

We can only wonder what the Scottish right-back must think of being dismissed so openly by his boss, especially when the Dutchman doesn’t exactly have an overflow of choice in that area of the pitch. The time-honoured proverb of not biting the hand that feeds you springs to mind.