Great observations re: both fullbacks in the build-up (can invert) as well as the attacking phase (attacks down the flanks, under & overlapping. Trent & Conor would thrive at RB with these tactics. However, that's not the case with Kostas at LB & Robbo would be awkward in the build-up.
If the early tactics become THE system, then the transfer rumor re: Ait Nouri starts to make a lot of sense. Ait Nouri was made for these tactics at LB because of his exceptional technical ability. He'll be an asset in build-up because he's very comfortable w the ball, strong at receiving/controlling & progressing thru passing and (importantly) by beating his marker on the dribble. In the final third, he's an equally strong attacker, a legitimate goal threat on the underlap. That's not true at all for Kostas (his discomfort on the ball was present long before Friday night). Robbo's technical ability is better but he isn't a natural footballer comfortable in the build-up.
I can see us signing Ait Nouri this summer & waiting to sign a CB, with Joey or Sepp as 4th and 5th CB this season or until January. If we signed Ait Nouri & assuming Curtis as a pivot, we have so much flexibility in the build-up. Trent can invert to form a double pivot w Curtis. Ait Nouri can do the same from LB. Macca and/or Dom can drop deeper to help build. Trent & Ait Nouri are rare in that they can do both the build-up and the attack exceptionally well. I'd pay his release clause ASAP (£38 million well spent).
The only thing is the links have been with Neto as well and I can’t remotely see us signing someone with Neto’s injury history… so I’m not sure what that says of that rumour
Haven’t really seen enough of Ait Nouri to compare to robbo to kostas
I like Neto a lot but struggle to see how we sign him now due to injury history & goal output (chance creation / assists are exceptional but not the goals). My gut tells me that, instead of Neto, they pay Kudus' release clause next summer, after Mo departs. Back to the focus of the piece on fullbacks, let's do Ait Nouri this summer.
totally agree mate, it's all educated guesses & tea leaf reading ... but it's fun to talk strategy for squad-building.
for Mo's replacement, I'd start courting Kudus as it feels like he's ready for a breakout season, will be EPL-proven & has all the attributes.
for Virg, while he's slowed down & I wonder about his technical skills in this new build-up style, I'd rip up his current contract & extend him for 3YR including this season. Virg is still a unicorn & that's not likely to change thru 2026-27.
for the 6, there's no doubt we need one but the multi-talented ones are so rare that I don't see it happening. we could buy a younger "project" like Lavia but how much better than Tyler/Stefan will this new project be? we missed multiple opportunities for the "finished article" with Guimarães (Jan 2022), Tchouameni & Vitinha (Jun 2022), Caicedo (summer 2022 & last summer) & Rice (last summer). the club aren't interested in the "defensive-only" options like Ugarte. this season, I don't think they can buy what they want and they go with Curtis to play the 6 ... with 2 of Wata, Tyler or Stefan providing cover.
I think the club has the ability to go big on transfer fee for a couple of transformative signings, but it’s likely to be big fee rather than big wages.. (as that has a knock-one effect)
I don’t think Bruno is necessarily the type of 6 they want as he’d rather play 8 and he was available on release clause this summer if they really wanted.
Rice was never available, didn’t want to leave London..
Agree they don’t want a defensive only option.. that is a really interesting area because tbh I don’t know enough about slots style to really understand what kind of 6 he wants, but if it’s lots of build up in tight areas that ain’t rice atm anyway.
I hope we buy a 6 this summer.. if there is one available.. but if say Gordon, Sepp and Morton, maybe Beck, are deemed good enough I don’t mind going into the season with them and then going big on targets next season once slots had a year to work out what’s what and what’s missing..
Great piece Josh. I had the impression that people, Reds included, considered Betis as a Spanish version of Preston, totally ignoring the fact that they finished 7th in La Liga last season. Betis did not seem to make much headway against us under Slotts methods and this did seem to get under the skin of Fakir, for one, who must have been relishing the idea of playing the Reds...so many young opponents giving him the chance to show what we missed out on. Didn't happen for him, anyway.
Great piece, Josh. I love the solidity this gives us against the ball when play breaks down. Question - Do you know if Slot is receptive to data? As in, have you heard of him (or his staff) using data to dictate any changes to his team or a players' role? Thanks
Lovely mate.. great spot.. yeah should be much easier to balance the team in this way with a more classic style, and hopefully a more patient approach will allow us to stay a bit more compact too!
A couple of other things I thought I noticed in build up but not sure if it was a pattern..
Short vertical passes from the 6 to a runner dropping back in midfield.. especially in the first 30mins when betis were pressing relatively hard, there were a couple of passes to get the 6 into space to turn and play a quick short vertical pass into one of the advanced midfielders dropping back. Endo got caught on a couple of these but seemed a definite change..
Last of long passes & switches.. obviously without Trent or VVD it was only really Quansah who popped a couple of balls over the top to Salah… but this was a really noticeable, albeit expected, difference.
I might have imagined it though, preseason games are hard to stay engaged!
Bradley looked good. Be interesting to see what happens with Trent. Nyoni also excellent, but just too young for force his way into any major plans. And I’d probably sell Endo given the stylistic shift.
Agree with Josh's comment re: selling Wata. Everyone is getting used to this new playing style but, whereas Curtis looks very comfortable Friday night in the build-up, Wata seems like a fish out of water. I wonder if they see Tyler as Wata's equal in this new playing style & are looking to sell Wata & keep Tyler as Curtis' deputy instead of another loan (+Stefan)?
The timing of the rumor is strange given that Romano reports this offer was rejected days/weeks ago by Marseille who have since bought Hojbjerg. Seems it's either Wata's team leaking it bc he wants out or Hughes leaking it to incite more / higher bids (more likely).
Interesting.. I’d rather they signed another 6 first though.. are you thinking Bajcetic, Morton +1?
Slot was saying they expect Nyoni to grow a few more inches.. must have tall parents I guess.. imagine it’ll be a very careful introduction to try and avoid those growth spurt injuries..
Nice article. But with regard to TAA is whether he wants to play Right Back. That is going to be the big question. But at least Bradley has shown his ability and learnt the Slot way.
The one player I have been disappointed with this summer is Joe Gomez.
He played minutes last year but not massive amounts and he played zero at Euro 2024.
By not coming back early he has not only given Van Den Berg, Quansah, Bradley and Kostas a huge head start with the boss that agonies is now playing so much catch up particularly as he has lost all the valuable technical time in pre-season with Slot. Gomez is likely no 3rd choice right back, 3rd choice left back and 5th choice Centre back.
Knowing he was a squad player, he should have been pushing as hard as he could. After all next summer there are no competitions. My guess is that Slot has also thought that attitude sucks and why there is now a lot of noise over Gomez.
Great observations re: both fullbacks in the build-up (can invert) as well as the attacking phase (attacks down the flanks, under & overlapping. Trent & Conor would thrive at RB with these tactics. However, that's not the case with Kostas at LB & Robbo would be awkward in the build-up.
If the early tactics become THE system, then the transfer rumor re: Ait Nouri starts to make a lot of sense. Ait Nouri was made for these tactics at LB because of his exceptional technical ability. He'll be an asset in build-up because he's very comfortable w the ball, strong at receiving/controlling & progressing thru passing and (importantly) by beating his marker on the dribble. In the final third, he's an equally strong attacker, a legitimate goal threat on the underlap. That's not true at all for Kostas (his discomfort on the ball was present long before Friday night). Robbo's technical ability is better but he isn't a natural footballer comfortable in the build-up.
I can see us signing Ait Nouri this summer & waiting to sign a CB, with Joey or Sepp as 4th and 5th CB this season or until January. If we signed Ait Nouri & assuming Curtis as a pivot, we have so much flexibility in the build-up. Trent can invert to form a double pivot w Curtis. Ait Nouri can do the same from LB. Macca and/or Dom can drop deeper to help build. Trent & Ait Nouri are rare in that they can do both the build-up and the attack exceptionally well. I'd pay his release clause ASAP (£38 million well spent).
The only thing is the links have been with Neto as well and I can’t remotely see us signing someone with Neto’s injury history… so I’m not sure what that says of that rumour
Haven’t really seen enough of Ait Nouri to compare to robbo to kostas
I like Neto a lot but struggle to see how we sign him now due to injury history & goal output (chance creation / assists are exceptional but not the goals). My gut tells me that, instead of Neto, they pay Kudus' release clause next summer, after Mo departs. Back to the focus of the piece on fullbacks, let's do Ait Nouri this summer.
I’ve given up ever trying to guess who were are going to sign tbh..
Hoping there are big plans in place to replace Mo and VVD over the next few years.. and to sign a 6 this summer ideally
totally agree mate, it's all educated guesses & tea leaf reading ... but it's fun to talk strategy for squad-building.
for Mo's replacement, I'd start courting Kudus as it feels like he's ready for a breakout season, will be EPL-proven & has all the attributes.
for Virg, while he's slowed down & I wonder about his technical skills in this new build-up style, I'd rip up his current contract & extend him for 3YR including this season. Virg is still a unicorn & that's not likely to change thru 2026-27.
for the 6, there's no doubt we need one but the multi-talented ones are so rare that I don't see it happening. we could buy a younger "project" like Lavia but how much better than Tyler/Stefan will this new project be? we missed multiple opportunities for the "finished article" with Guimarães (Jan 2022), Tchouameni & Vitinha (Jun 2022), Caicedo (summer 2022 & last summer) & Rice (last summer). the club aren't interested in the "defensive-only" options like Ugarte. this season, I don't think they can buy what they want and they go with Curtis to play the 6 ... with 2 of Wata, Tyler or Stefan providing cover.
I agree on Virg.. no idea with Mo.
I think the club has the ability to go big on transfer fee for a couple of transformative signings, but it’s likely to be big fee rather than big wages.. (as that has a knock-one effect)
I don’t think Bruno is necessarily the type of 6 they want as he’d rather play 8 and he was available on release clause this summer if they really wanted.
Rice was never available, didn’t want to leave London..
Agree they don’t want a defensive only option.. that is a really interesting area because tbh I don’t know enough about slots style to really understand what kind of 6 he wants, but if it’s lots of build up in tight areas that ain’t rice atm anyway.
I hope we buy a 6 this summer.. if there is one available.. but if say Gordon, Sepp and Morton, maybe Beck, are deemed good enough I don’t mind going into the season with them and then going big on targets next season once slots had a year to work out what’s what and what’s missing..
Great piece Josh. I had the impression that people, Reds included, considered Betis as a Spanish version of Preston, totally ignoring the fact that they finished 7th in La Liga last season. Betis did not seem to make much headway against us under Slotts methods and this did seem to get under the skin of Fakir, for one, who must have been relishing the idea of playing the Reds...so many young opponents giving him the chance to show what we missed out on. Didn't happen for him, anyway.
Great piece, Josh. I love the solidity this gives us against the ball when play breaks down. Question - Do you know if Slot is receptive to data? As in, have you heard of him (or his staff) using data to dictate any changes to his team or a players' role? Thanks
I haven’t, but I know he sees himself as a coach. He’s very training ground. Klopp wasn’t a data guy either, but he was open-minded enough to listen.
Lovely mate.. great spot.. yeah should be much easier to balance the team in this way with a more classic style, and hopefully a more patient approach will allow us to stay a bit more compact too!
A couple of other things I thought I noticed in build up but not sure if it was a pattern..
Short vertical passes from the 6 to a runner dropping back in midfield.. especially in the first 30mins when betis were pressing relatively hard, there were a couple of passes to get the 6 into space to turn and play a quick short vertical pass into one of the advanced midfielders dropping back. Endo got caught on a couple of these but seemed a definite change..
Last of long passes & switches.. obviously without Trent or VVD it was only really Quansah who popped a couple of balls over the top to Salah… but this was a really noticeable, albeit expected, difference.
I might have imagined it though, preseason games are hard to stay engaged!
Again, preseason, but Anyone stand out to you?
Bradley looked good. Be interesting to see what happens with Trent. Nyoni also excellent, but just too young for force his way into any major plans. And I’d probably sell Endo given the stylistic shift.
Agree with Josh's comment re: selling Wata. Everyone is getting used to this new playing style but, whereas Curtis looks very comfortable Friday night in the build-up, Wata seems like a fish out of water. I wonder if they see Tyler as Wata's equal in this new playing style & are looking to sell Wata & keep Tyler as Curtis' deputy instead of another loan (+Stefan)?
The timing of the rumor is strange given that Romano reports this offer was rejected days/weeks ago by Marseille who have since bought Hojbjerg. Seems it's either Wata's team leaking it bc he wants out or Hughes leaking it to incite more / higher bids (more likely).
Yeah I found that timing interesting but maybe leaked on tour
Interesting.. I’d rather they signed another 6 first though.. are you thinking Bajcetic, Morton +1?
Slot was saying they expect Nyoni to grow a few more inches.. must have tall parents I guess.. imagine it’ll be a very careful introduction to try and avoid those growth spurt injuries..
Nice article. But with regard to TAA is whether he wants to play Right Back. That is going to be the big question. But at least Bradley has shown his ability and learnt the Slot way.
The one player I have been disappointed with this summer is Joe Gomez.
He played minutes last year but not massive amounts and he played zero at Euro 2024.
By not coming back early he has not only given Van Den Berg, Quansah, Bradley and Kostas a huge head start with the boss that agonies is now playing so much catch up particularly as he has lost all the valuable technical time in pre-season with Slot. Gomez is likely no 3rd choice right back, 3rd choice left back and 5th choice Centre back.
Knowing he was a squad player, he should have been pushing as hard as he could. After all next summer there are no competitions. My guess is that Slot has also thought that attitude sucks and why there is now a lot of noise over Gomez.