Liverpool defender Ibrahima Konate has come under fire for his recent performances, but manager Arne Slot insists the centre-back is being unfairly singled out as the Reds struggle for consistency.
Konate was below par in both last weekend’s 2-1 Premier League defeat at Crystal Palace and the 1-0 Champions League reverse in Istanbul against Galatasaray on Tuesday, prompting criticism from fans and pundits alike.
But Slot believes the criticism is misplaced, with errors from the centre-back part of a wider problem affecting the team.
“If you lose like we did versus Galatasaray and Palace, it doesn’t help if you lose the ball easily,” Slot said. “He has been one of them, definitely not the only one, because against Galatasaray, apart from the penalty, maybe they got three or four moments from us losing simple balls without any pressure, which happened to him once in the Crystal Palace game and Galatasaray.”
The Liverpool head coach was keen to stress that focusing on isolated moments paints an incomplete picture.
“If you lose a game of football, there is so much focus on that moment and all of a sudden, 90 minutes have been very poor. That’s not what I analyse. I go through the game one more time and see what we did well and what we did wrong,” Slot explained.
“In the last two games, it has been obvious and clear we have made a few errors, not only him but others we are not used to. If you do things people are not used to and lose a game of football, then normally the manager gets criticism.”
While Konate has been criticised, Slot also addressed the form of Liverpool star Mohamed Salah, who has struggled to replicate the blistering levels of previous campaigns.
Salah has six goal contributions in the opening nine games of the season and has only scored five goals in his last 20 competitive appearances, a period stretching back to the end of last season. Slot outlined why he believes Salah’s scoring exploits have slowed.
“I see the same as the second half of last season, where he scored 12 goals five from a penalty and one from a set-piece, so six open-play goals,” Slot said. “He is part of a team that faces different opposition than the first half of last season.”
Slot explained that how teams set up against Liverpool has changed, making it harder for the Reds to create chances from open play.
“To make that more of an insight, if you compare how we won the away game against United, where they tried to play out from the back and we took the ball off them three times, and at Anfield when Onana only went long, that’s one of the answers why it is more difficult for us to score from open play,” Slot added.
“Mo is a part of this and you can see this in the second half of last season and the first part of this season. But now you are focused on Mo, the next time you are focused on Florian [Wirtz], then you are focused on Cody [Gakpo].”
Slot was keen to emphasise that the issue is not Salah alone but a team-wide challenge as Liverpool adapt to a new setup.
“What I’m trying to say is that we don’t score as many open-play goals as we did in the first part of last season and this is something we work on very hard. The more we play under the new setup, the better it will go. But we still struggle a bit to find enough goals from open play in the second half of last season and the first part of this season.”
Slot’s comments underline that Liverpool’s recent woes are not the fault of one player alone. While Konate and Salah have come under fire, the Reds’ struggles are part of a wider tactical challenge and the manager believes, with time, his side will rediscover the form that has made them one of Europe’s top teams and ultimately Premier League champions.
