Article by Aurelian Botezatu – Published Sunday, January 25, 2026, 07:46 / Updated Sunday, January 25, 2026 07:46
Liverpool, the team coached by Arne Slot, lost at Bournemouth 3-2. The English press writes that the Dutch manager is under pressure again.
Defeat to Bournemouth, albeit after a 13-game unbeaten run, has re-opened discussions about manager Arne Slot. The Sun suggested that the Dutchman's side were “too open” and that “the game looked like a basketball game”. And the conclusion was that “after a step forward, Liverpool took two huge steps back on Saturday night“.
The Liverpool Echo newspaper, meanwhile, appreciates that “the Liverpool manager is now under renewed pressure after a 13-game unbeaten run ended in painful, dramatic and entirely avoidable fashion. The truth is that the Reds have won just four of their five league games this year. It's just not enough“.
Arne Slot blames the players' fatigue
Slot? In front of the cameras, the Dutch coach blamed the failure on his players' recent fatigue and explained why he argued with the referee after the final whistle.
“You could see that my players were tired, because we only had two days of rest before this match“, he said. Liverpool were coming from the trip to Marseille (3-0), in the Champions League, and then, to reach the south coast of England, they had to travel 300 kilometers.
Arne Slot: “I told the referee that!”
On the conflict with the referee of the meeting, Michael Salisbury, Slot said that he resented the few additional minutes dictated. “I thought four minutes of extra time wasn't enough. In the end it didn't matter because they still scored, but four minutes of overtime was not enough for this match.
There were VAR moments, there were changes… I told that to the referee,” explained Slot. Liverpool scored the last goal, the one that decided the game, in the 90th+5th minute.
