Liverpool and Arne Slot are in ‘survival mode’ — and it could still get worse | OneFootball

Arne Slot had used the phrase “survival mode”. The probability is that Liverpool will not survive this; not in the Champions League, anyway, not when 2-0 down to Paris Saint-Germain, not when a team who did not muster a shot on target in the Parc des Princes may need to score three or four goals next week, not when a side who have lost 16 games this season face the champions of Europe.

The broader question remains if Slot survives a season that has promised so much and delivered so little. Many at the club will hope so, many in the fanbase not.

Liverpool’s campaign has gone awry to such an extent that, barring a spectacular comeback against PSG, the rematch is arguably their least significant remaining fixture. The priority regarding the Champions League is simply qualifying for it again. With one point from their last three Premier League games, no victory in the competition since February, that is far from guaranteed.

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Liverpool captain Virgil van Dijk said ‘probably no one gives us a chance’ of coming back against PSG (Getty)

The financial cost from a failure to qualify would be considerable for a club who spent £450m last summer, have already committed a further £55m for this summer and look in need of another expensive overhaul. They spent a lot to look outclassed by PSG even if Giorgi Mamardashvili, one of the 2025 arrivals, at least delivered his best display for the club. That was nevertheless in part because the goalkeeper was required to.

Slot’s tactical rejig still indicated the extent to which plans have had to be redrawn as Liverpool have struggled. He played a back five for the first time in his tenure. It was a response to the 4-0 shellacking at Manchester City. “I think if you look at that game at the weekend, then things couldn't get much worse,” said captain Virgil van Dijk.

A double act who drove the club to European glory two decades ago were divided as to its merits. Steven Gerrard, captain of the triumphant 2005 team, said it was total domination but that “Liverpool’s tactics and gameplan worked for large periods of the game”. Jamie Carragher, the vice-captain, said Slot “got it massively wrong tactically”.

Yet maybe with this Liverpool there are no right tactics. Jeremie Frimpong at least finally occupied the role he usually played at Bayer Leverkusen, as a wing-back, but Slot may have reservations about him as a full-back. “I think we have the players that can play in the system,” said Van Dijk. But Liverpool only have three fit centre-backs, one of whom, Joe Gomez, is not always fit anyway. It will be hard to use this shape every match even if they want to.

Slot suggested it was a bespoke gameplan for PSG and asked: “What if we would have played with real wingers here today? How would that have looked like against [Achraf] Hakimi and Nuno Mendes?” The implication was that Mohamed Salah, an unused substitute, would not have tracked back against flying full-backs.

The Liverpool of Gerrard and Carragher, under Gerard Houllier and Rafa Benitez, were no strangers to defensive tactics away from home in Europe. It can grate with some that this Liverpool played like underdogs. The reality, though, is that they were underdogs. They are again for the second leg.

“Probably no one gives us a chance,” said Van Dijk, who will look to rally his teammates for the second leg with memories of the stirring fightback against Barcelona in 2019. But that was a Liverpool team approaching the peak of its considerable powers. This is one in a strange blend of transition and decline.

Van Dijk seemed to reference his own footballing mortality. “Things will eventually always come to an end, including my time at a certain point,” said a player who turns 35 in July. “At a certain point things come to an end and then others have to carry on hopefully with successes, of course.”

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A tactical gamble did not succeed in shutting out PSG’s marauding front line (Getty)

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Jamie Carragher blasted Ibrahima Konate for his display against PSG (Getty)

Van Dijk has a further year left on his contract. Even as his own form has been mixed, he has never been more significant in some respects: his availability when others are absent has at least prevented things from getting worse. Liverpool have looked to sign the future, in the injured Giovanni Leoni and incoming Jeremy Jacquet. The axis of Van Dijk and the out-of-contract, and sometimes out-of-sorts, Ibrahima Konate may be broken up.

Liverpool already know other things are coming to an end: Salah’s Anfield career, for starters. It looks still less likely that it will end in a Champions League final in Budapest. For Andy Robertson, whose contract ends in the summer, there may be no fourth Champions League final, either, and not merely because, even if Liverpool get past PSG, there are few reasons to think they would then eliminate Bayern Munich or Real Madrid. Van Dijk may yet be the last survivor of a great team, along with Alisson.

Even as there was another glimpse of what was supposed to be Liverpool’s future, in Alexander Isak’s reappearance, Liverpool left Paris with the problem that they could do with their season being curtailed now, when they still have fifth place in the Premier League. But the defining period beckons, and it risks getting worse. For the team, and the manager, the task is just to survive it.