Arne Slot pleased with Liverpool pre season after 4-1 Las Palmas win
11/08/2024
Anfield Stadium, Liverpool, UK
11/08/2024
Anfield Stadium, Liverpool, UK
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SportsTranscript
00:00Hi, good afternoon. It's been a good pre-season for you, results-wise, hasn't it?
00:12But how are you feeling in terms of where you are fitness-wise with everybody after today?
00:18Are you where you want to be?
00:21No, ideally we would have had them from the start, all of them,
00:24and then players like Virgil and all the others then went off after 67 minutes,
00:29they could have played the whole game, but I'm pleased if you look at the situation,
00:34so these players had to go to a holiday, a lot of them came back really strong,
00:39and the ones I had from the start have stayed fit for all the time,
00:43so yeah, pleased with the fitness level the team has,
00:48and also with our injuries at the moment, and that's an important thing in pre-season.
00:54So it's still a very important week ahead now for you having everybody to train together?
01:01Yeah, but not only an important week, an important year to come,
01:04we have to improve day by day, and I think we saw today in both games a lot of good things,
01:11but I can make a big list also of things we have to improve, which is completely normal.
01:17Some of them with certain new ideas, we have only been with this for a week,
01:24so they have to adjust on that, they have to adjust on each other maybe with some new ideas,
01:30so it's normal that we are far from perfect, but even being far from perfect we can score four,
01:37so that's a good start.
01:39I know it was only a friendly, but how did you find your first experience
01:45of being at Anfield playing in front of fans?
01:48Yeah, that's always nice, no matter which team you lead,
01:52always if you play a home game it's always nice,
01:55and if you lead a team with 15,000 fans it's nice,
01:58if you lead them with 50,000 it's even nicer,
02:00and if you lead a team that has 60,000 fans that are also constantly behind the team,
02:05similar to my former club at Feyenoord, then there are always games to look forward to,
02:10and I got a taste of it today.
02:14Can I just ask you about strengthening the squad in the transfer window that remains,
02:19nobody has been brought in as yet, are you still on the lookout?
02:24I think as a club like we are, we are always looking if we can strengthen the squad,
02:29but it's not so easy to strengthen the squad if you've seen them at both games today,
02:33so I've said many times before that I've inherited a real strong team,
02:40and if we can and if we think it's possible we will strengthen the squad,
02:45but only if we think we can and if it's possible.
02:48So no names like Martin Superbending?
02:51You can come up with every name you want, of course!
02:54Can I just ask you about Fabio Carvalho,
02:57has agreement gone through with Brentford for his move away from Liverpool?
03:02From what has been told to me there is an agreement in place,
03:08but I haven't spoken with a club, and I was fully focused today on this game,
03:15so I don't know exactly what the status of him is,
03:19but that was of course the reason why he wasn't selected today.
03:25I just want to set that he wasn't involved in the games today,
03:29is that a fitness issue or something going on in the future?
03:32No, there's load management, the way we call it,
03:36and of course a player like Ned, who's been training with us for a long time,
03:40deserves to have some playing time as well.
03:43So it's a combination of a player that has already made a lot of minutes,
03:46and we don't want to take the risk of him getting injured,
03:49as we don't want with anyone,
03:51but with him we thought it was best for him not to start today,
03:54and that had all to do with load management,
03:57and that Ned also deserved to play today.
04:06You've rotated quite a few of the deep line midfielders,
04:09do you have an idea of an ice-cold team,
04:13but who will be put off that box?
04:16It was a bit fluke last season, Paz played there, Endo played there,
04:20do you have an idea?
04:22You mean with deep, you mean the number six position?
04:26And your question is?
04:28You wanted to try a few there,
04:31do you now have a better idea of who is more suited to be in that box?
04:35Yeah, sometimes that also had to do with the players we had available,
04:38the ones I've tried over there.
04:41I think we've seen mostly Wata, Endo over there, or Ryan,
04:46and in the previous game even Dominic was a bit lower.
04:50But I have quite a good idea of which player suits there at this moment,
04:54in my opinion, best,
04:56but like I said, we're only one week working together with some players,
05:00so sometimes you feel, oh, this is the best number six,
05:04but then the combination with the other two might maybe not work out that well.
05:09So it's not to say that the ones that play today will play next week or the weeks after,
05:13we're still in a situation where we constantly evaluate
05:18which is the best team for us and which is the best line-up,
05:22and today you saw this, but it's not to say it's the same next week.
05:27Very nice one, Nick.
05:29Josh, you can take on for your name to be sung today in the first game,
05:34how do you feel about the way the fans in the city have embraced you so far?
05:38No, only positives.
05:41What you hear is that they sing my name,
05:45but when I'm in the city, or I've stayed for a while in the Titanic,
05:49those people and also the one at AXA have been really nice to me,
05:53but it's mostly like this if you become a head coach,
05:56people are nice to you, especially if you haven't lost yet,
06:00although we did lose once against Preston.
06:04So that helps, but in general I think people have been nice to me
06:08and have given me a warm welcome, not only me, but the rest of my staff as well.