Arne Slot says Chelsea have mastered the Premier League's 'new reality'

Liverpool boss Arne Slot has been speaking about Chelsea’s strength as he prepares his side for their trip to Stamford Bridge on Saturday. The Reds have had a tough week, losing to Crystal Palace in the league and then suffering their first Champions League defeat of the season when they came up short against Galatasaray on Tuesday night.

Liverpool had not been playing particularly well going into those fixtures, but they were still grinding out wins prior to coming out of those games empty-handed

Fortunately for the Reds, they still have a two-point gap at the top as they prepare to face a Chelsea side that has been in rocky form in the Premier League, with Enzo Maresca’s men failing to win any of their last three in the league.

Injuries haven’t helped the Blues, but Liverpool know this will be a tricky game, and Slot wants his side to get more out of set-pieces against a Chelsea side that has done well in that department.

“So, we play tomorrow [against] Chelsea, I think they've scored more than 50 per cent of their goals from set-pieces,” he pointed out in his press conference. “So, this is the new reality in the Premier League and we were doing this really well [in the] second part of last season. This season, we have had many chances from set-pieces as well – unfortunately we didn't score yet.”

Liverpool have not defended set-pieces and throws well across the last week, but it’s scoring from set-pieces that Slot wants to get right. He added: “What I just said, we've been very close to scoring [from] set-pieces this season already. Ibou [Konate], a big chance against Galatasaray and a big chance against Palace. So, I'm very happy about the amount of chances we generate from set-pieces, but we haven't scored yet and is that luck, bad luck?

“At this moment of time, I would say we are a bit unlucky. If it just keeps on going throughout the whole season, it might have to do with other things as well. But what I'm trying to say is, open-play goals [in] the second part of last season and the first part of last season is the main difference. I don't think we do things different. I do see teams doing a lot of things different to us.

“So, the first part of last season Jürgen [Klopp] gave me a lot of gifts but one of the gifts he also gave me was ending up third the year before and fifth the year before and him being so well known that a new manager came in and everybody thought, 'Oh, let's start to play against Liverpool'! And teams played in a completely different way in the first half of the season against us than they did when we were top of the league after half of the season and when we were top of the Champions League after the first part of the season. And I can see this going now into this part of this season. We have to find answers to that. Last season, one of the answers was a set-piece, like many teams unlock a low block with set-pieces. And this season we haven't done that yet.”

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