Liverpool head to West Ham in the Premier League on Sunday afternoon seeking to turn around their dire form
Arne Slot after Liverpool’s 5-0 win at West Ham last season
For a good example of everything Liverpool have lost you need only look at their trip to West Ham last season.
It was 11 months ago yesterday that the Reds rolled into east London on a crest of a wave, flying high at home and in Europe and pulling eight points clear at the top of the Premier League with a 5-0 win.
Luis Diaz, starting centrally but drifting in dangerously from the left, opened the scoring with a smart finish after an incisive run.
Mo Salah then took over, showing all the skills that would lead to him sweeping the Footballer of the Year awards when he pirouetted away from Konstantinos Mavropanos, nutmegged Max Kilman and put it on a plate for Cody Gakpo to score. Then four minutes later he scored himself.
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In the second half Trent Alexander-Arnold would make it 4-0 with a shot from distance, responding with a gesture suggesting that he was blocking out the noise about his own, much-discussed future.
And then Diogo Jota scored the fifth in that fabulous, unfussy way of his after a superb Salah run.
Back then Arne Slot was beaming on the London Stadium touchline as he surveyed his side’s final match of the calendar year, yet now he finds himself under a cloud as his second season in English football goes rapidly downhill.
Slot’s side are in the bottom half of the table and have lost nine of their last 12 matches in all competitions, the type of run not seen from reigning champions since… well, since Manchester City last season when they did the exact same thing.
Liverpool aren’t looking elsewhere though during what has become an unfolding crisis.
The three-goal defeats to Nottingham Forest and PSV Eindhoven in the past week represent the kind of losses just not accepted at Anfield, and they led to Virgil van Dijk putting out an impassioned plea via the club website.
“We’re facing one of the toughest moments of our journey, but we refuse to let this define us,” said Van Dijk. “We will rise from this. I believe in this team with everything I have.
“Nothing has ever been handed to us – we’ve fought for everything, and this moment is no different.
“We won’t give in. Won’t give up. Every challenge is an opportunity. We must grow together, lift each other up, and show the strength that lies within us.”
That strength was evident last December at West Ham, and it will need to be again on Sunday afternoon if Slot is to turn around a situation that has got away from him.
Defeat here is not likely to lead directly to an awkward conversation with club chiefs on Monday morning, but if it is followed by poor results against Sunderland on Wednesday and then at Leeds United next Saturday then Slot’s position at the club will come under even more pressure.
His last trip to West Ham was a clear step on the way to title glory, but this time around he needs it to represent so much more.