Slot shows he can rotate, but Liverpool’s real tests start now

LONDON — Liverpool are going to face tougher tasks than this trip to Selhurst Park over the next two months, but their 1-0 win over Crystal Palace proved that Arne Slot can rotate his team and still get a key victory, even ending the match with debutant Vitezslav Jaros in goal.

As Feyenoord supporters will know well, Slot favours sticking with a settled side from match to match, making as few changes as possible. But in this lunchtime kickoff, coming just 2½ days after their 2-0 Champions League win over Bologna, Slot tinkered and his Liverpool side still produced the goods.

Slot made four changes from the team that beat Bologna midweek, with Kostas Tsimikas, Curtis Jones, Diogo Jota and Cody Gakpo all starting while Andrew Robertson, Luis Díaz, Darwin Núñez and Dominik Szoboszlai made way. Outside of the many changes made for the Carabao Cup win over West Ham, this matched the most switches he has made from one match to the next.

His policy of sticking with a favoured lineup drew criticism when his team looked out of sorts in their 1-0 defeat at home to Nottingham Forest three weeks ago. It was their first match back after the international break, where 10 of his 11 starters had played both matches for their national sides across the globe. In the week following that defeat, he pointed to his remarkable record, saying: “If rotation would be the reason why you don’t win a game, then it probably wouldn’t be the first game I lost in 2024 because at Feyenoord, we didn’t rotate a lot.”

Feyenoord used the second-fewest players in the Eredivisie (25) over the course of the 2023-24 season, and were ranked 11th out of the 18 teams in the Dutch league for total changes to the starting team. But Slot shuffled things at Selhurst Park, and the effect was a seamless transition from one win to the next, leaving Liverpool top of the league for a few hours at least and in a strong position heading into the second international break.

Liverpool controlled possession, enjoying 68.1% of the ball, scoring the only goal of the game after eight minutes through Diogo Jota. Palace looked vulnerable on the flanks and that proved to be their undoing as Gakpo found space behind Daniel Muñoz to tee up the Portugal international. But this was still short of the ruthless, all-dominating performance Slot demanded prematch as they should have been three or four up by half-time. Slot wants his team to put their foot on the opposition’s neck from the outset and keep that pressure on.

But this match may have come at a cost. Alexis Mac Allister was replaced at the interval, while Alisson Becker suffered another injury when making a clearance with 11 minutes to go. Caoimhín Kelleher, who started the 3-0 win over Bournemouth two weeks ago because of another injury to the Brazilian No. 1, is an able deputy but was unavailable on Saturday due to illness. On in Alisson’s place came the unknown Jaros, making his Liverpool debut at the age of 23 after seven years on the club’s books.

Jaros, who has had previous loan spells with St Patrick’s Athletic, Notts County and Stockport County, played his last competitive match for SK Sturm Graz in May. He made 14 appearances for the Austrian club in the second half of last season to help them win the league title, leading his his first full cap for Czechia in the summer; he’s not just some inexperienced goalkeeper being thrust into the limelight. He ended up doing what was required, but with sterner tasks lying in wait, Liverpool will hope to have Alisson or Kelleher available.

Now we’ll find out what Slot is made of after a highly promising start, a true understanding of their durability. Chelsea (H), Arsenal (A), Brighton & Hove Albion (H), Aston Villa (H), Southampton (A), Manchester City (H), Newcastle United (A) and Everton (A) are up next in the Premier League, interspersed with Champions League dates at RB Leipzig and at home to Bayer Leverkusen and Real Madrid. It’s going to test the depth of Slot’s squad, and he might need become accustomed to shuffling his pack more.

This match also showed that Liverpool might be ready to fall in love the Saturday lunchtime kickoffs, which Klopp had made abundantly clear he despised. Liverpool are two wins from two on the early Saturday fixture this season, with Slot saying before the game: “If 12:30 is a difficult time to perform then I’m a really stupid manager because we train every day at 12.” He doesn’t appear to be a manager who’s keen to rail against the system or scheduling.

For Palace, this was yet another match that has passed them by. Having finished last term in such brilliant fashion with six wins from seven, they are winless after their opening seven matches. Manager Oliver Glasner has had to build a new team here after losing Joachim Andersen, Michael Olise and Jordan Ayew in the summer, and then bringing in Trevoh Chalobah, Maxence Lacroix and Eddie Nketiah on transfer deadline day. They’re still blending an understanding, but it remains to be seen how much patience the board has for this to turn around as the boos rang out at full time.