Arne Slot's 'no excuse' assessment of Crystal Palace defeat sounds a lot like an excuse

Arne Slot has been speaking after Liverpool’s second defeat to Crystal Palace in a matter of weeks. The Eagles thrashed the Reds at Anfield, winning 3-0 on Wednesday night to progress to the quarter-finals of the Carabao Cup.

Ismaila Sarr scored twice to make it three in two games against Liverpool, and Yeremy Pino added to his assist with a goal. Palace actually started Liverpool’s awful run of form just a few weeks ago when they ended the Merseyside club’s unbeaten start, and since then, Slot’s men have lost six out of their last seven games, and they have lost four straight in the Premier League.

Speaking after the game, Slot emphasised that he did not want to make excuses while seemingly making excuses over the number of players he has available, and with new signings struggling to adjust to the demands of playing in multiple competitions.

“It is always a blow to lose a game of football, especially if it leads to going out of a competition,” he said. “But it is the same selection I did tonight as I did last season in rounds like this. There are many reasons, maybe, why we've lost six out of seven – none of them are good enough to accept losing so many. I can come up with arguments or reasons, but none of them will be enough to go to that standard because at Liverpool losing six out of seven is always too much.

“If I look at our performance against Brentford, to use that as an example, two days after we played [Eintracht] Frankfurt away, I saw there a team that maybe struggled with playing three games in seven days. Again, not an excuse to lose that game of football, but it is not a complete surprise to me if I see some of the struggles some players have had in pre-season and players that came from different leagues and it is a new challenge for them to play at Premier League and Champions League level in three games in seven days.

“So, again, in two days we play [Aston] Villa and the last time I played a player we thought was ready for their programme but it turned out maybe he wasn't was Alexander Isak when he went out with an injury [at Frankfurt]. Last time we played Southampton, Giovanni Leoni went out with an injury in a game like this and we got the red card for Hugo Ekitike after two yellows.

“I think at this moment in time, with only 15 or 16 players available – and I am talking then about players of our squad available – and to add to that this club has always used this competition to use their academy players as well – the non-starters and the academy players – it felt to me as the right decision and I haven't changed my opinion about that after the result because with our starters we haven't been able to win a lot from Palace as well.”

Slot can say there is ‘no excuse’, but those comments sound a lot like an excuse when he is listing many of the reasons why his side did not compete well in the defeat to Palace. The Reds boss sounds like a manager with limited options after a transfer window that saw the Premier League champions spend £446million, the most ever spent by a British club in a single window.

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