Liverpool’s 5-1 evisceration of Tottenham Hotspur on Sunday was less a victory, more a coronation – a fitting finale to a season where the Premier League’s famous relentlessness was tamed by a softly-spoken Dutchman with the sharpest of minds.
When Arne Slot was unveiled last summer as Jurgen Klopp’s successor, many questioned the wisdom of appointing a coach who had never ventured beyond the Eredivisie. How could a man more familiar with the provincial towns of the Netherlands than the cauldrons of the Premier League hope to replace a figure as titanic as Klopp?
The response to those doubters has been emphatic.
Stood in the Anfield dugout on Sunday evening, arms aloft, serenaded by a sea of red, Slot cut a figure of intelligence, humility and devotion to a clarity of purpose – even after watching his side trail to a 12th-minute Dominic Solanke header. Slot trusted his charges to respond; they always do.
The seeds of Liverpool’s record-equalling 20th English league title were sown long before Slot arrived. They were planted during a playing career where he freely admits he compensated for a lack of pace with a deep understanding of football’s nuances. “I was slow – some even said very slow,” Slot once laughed. “I had to think faster than I could run.”
That insight manifested itself early. As part of an unheralded Sparta Rotterdam midfield in 2009, Slot famously challenged his manager Foeke Booy’s tactics in front of his teammates before a game against Ajax. His recommendation – a tweak in the press – led to a stunning 4-0 victory and, remarkably, the resignation of Marco van Basten, one of football’s most revered figures, as Ajax coach.
Van Basten would later become a mentor of sorts, describing Slot with an admiration rare among the Dutch football aristocracy. “Tactically, he is brilliant,” Van Basten said. “Calm, mega-intelligent. He makes players believe without them even noticing.”
That belief has manifested itself in the reinvention of some and the reinvigoration of others at Liverpool. Ryan Gravenberch looked a player unsure if he belonged anywhere on the pitch under Klopp but looks like he was born to anchor Liverpool's midfield under Slot. At the back, Virgil van Dijk again looks impenetrable again while forward Mohamed Salah is on course for a record-breaking campaign.
Salah's goal against Spurs was his 46th goal involvement of the season (28 goals, 18 assists) in 34 league games, leaving him one shy of Alan Shearer and Andy Cole's mark – even though theirs came in a 42-game season.
Asked if Slot had made him a better player, Salah joked: “You can see the numbers – it seems so!”
Salah's superb form has been the catalyst for Liverpool's success this season and he recently ended speculation over his future by signing a contract extension.
The Egyptian, 32, has bounced back from a less impressive campaign under Klopp last season and is the frontrunner to win the 2025 Ballon d'Or.
Asked to explain the improvement, Salah said: “Now I don't have to defend much. The tactics are quite different. I said 'as long as you rest me defensively I will provide offensively', so I am glad that I did. He [Slot] listened a lot and you can see the numbers.”
Slot's willingness to listen to his players is steeped in an understanding of education, inherited from his parents, both teachers. A young Slot would sit quietly in dressing rooms, absorbing every nuance of his father’s team talks to amateur footballers. That early exposure to clear, deliberate communication underpins Slot's coaching style today.
At Cambuur and later AZ Alkmaar, Slot’s teams became synonymous with a crisp, controlled brand of football that owed much to his admiration of Pep Guardiola’s Barcelona. Passing was paramount.
When he led Feyenoord to the Eredivisie title in 2023, Tottenham came calling. Slot stayed loyal to the Rotterdam club then, but when Liverpool’s offer came, he heeded his own advice: “Sometimes in life, opportunities come along and you have to listen.”
Stepping into the cavernous void left by Klopp was a task many might have shrunk from. Not Slot. His approach was neither to imitate nor to eradicate. Instead, he blended Klopp’s high-energy DNA with his own preference for controlled domination. Out went the frenzy; in came the finesse.
His tactical refinements – particularly a 4-2-3-1 formation – liberated the likes of Salah, Trent Alexander-Arnold and Curtis Jones – rarely more than a fringe player under Klopp – and instilled an iron discipline in Gravenberch that, along with influence of Alexis Mac Allister, has been the foundation on which Liverpool's season has been built.
“The culture was already here,” Slot said, ever humble. “I just tried to add a little bit.”
Eight wins from their first nine matches set the tone. Liverpool never truly faltered. By the time the final whistle blew on Sunday, Slot had orchestrated one of the most seamless managerial transitions in recent memory – a revolution, not with fanfare, but with the simple beauty of intelligent football played at the highest level.
Slot has written his name into Anfield folklore, joining Joe Fagan and Kenny Dalglish as the only Liverpool managers to win the league in their debut campaign and only the fifth coach to do so in the Premier League era. He is the first Dutchman to win an English top-flight title.
On Sunday, the man from the Netherlands stayed humble, paying homage to the man he succeeded as he led the crowd in a rendition of “Jurgen Klopp”, just as the German had teed up his successor on his farewell last season.
As Anfield rocked to chants of his own name, Slot merely smiled – a man who knows that the cleverest moves are often the quietest.
