Liverpool's search for Jurgen Klopp's replacement looks to have led them to Feyenoord's Arne Slot. The Dutchman has enjoyed two fantastic years in the Eredivisie, and looks like a natural fit for the club's style of play... but is he?
FourFourTwo's Adam Clery takes an extensive look at his style of play and assesses why he's perfect and, also, why he isn't.
FourFourTwo's Adam Clery takes an extensive look at his style of play and assesses why he's perfect and, also, why he isn't.
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00:00Hi, how is it, and I was at Gannon Pet, Adam Cleary from 442 here, and today it's finally
00:09time to talk about Arnie Slott, and just what a really funny name that is, plus also if
00:16he's a good fit for Liverpool.
00:19Right, okay, so Feyenoord, I've definitely been watching loads of them this season.
00:26The funny thing is, during the extensive research stage I conducted for this video, I've seen
00:31lots of conflicting things about him, like different managers he's influenced by, different
00:36styles of play, different approaches in possession, different approaches out of possession, none
00:40of it really seems to line up to one consistent thing, and I actually think that's a pretty
00:46good defining trait of him as a manager.
00:48Like if you've never seen Feyenoord play before, this is probably the best way to think of
00:54Arnie Slott in your head that you have.
00:56You'll see him get loads of comparisons to Jurgen Klopp, and in some regards, specifically
01:01how his teams are out of possession, he is a lot like Jurgen Klopp, but the thing is
01:05when they have the ball, when they're in possession, they're a lot more like a Pep Guardiola side,
01:10or more specifically, like Roberto de Zerbi.
01:13But then of course, sometimes the way they defend is a lot more like how Mikel Arteta
01:17has Arsenal setting up, you'll get loads of people talking about how from a personality
01:22perspective, he's very much like Ange-Pas de Coglou, and then just purely in terms of
01:26aesthetics, he looks loads like Baron Harkonnen from Dune.
01:30So much to discuss.
01:32Okay, so first off, let's get through the Liverpool comparisons, right?
01:35This is largely how Feyenoord have been this season, sometimes it's a 4-3-3, there are
01:41a couple of players who come in and out, but by and large, this has been their best shape
01:45and their best team.
01:46Now like I said, it's mostly out of possession where they resemble Liverpool, but you wouldn't
01:50say it's necessarily this Liverpool they resemble, it's more like classic Klopp Liverpool.
01:56And what they'll do is they'll push the entire team right up to the halfway line to restrict
01:59the amount of space available for the opposition to play in, they'll target a perceived weak
02:03link in their build-up, and then just rather than sort of like headlessly charging around
02:08just trying to cause a bit of chaos, they'll pick the moments to win the ball very, very
02:13well.
02:14So actually, just before I continue, we're going to look at a lot of Eredivisie stats
02:18in this video because that's where they play, and you've kind of just got to like mentally
02:22snip out PSV this season because they're doing some kind of weird superhuman freak thing
02:27that nobody really predicted, and as a result, all the charts that Feyenoord should be top
02:32of and were top of last year, and would probably be top of next year as well, they're now second
02:37because PSV are like insane.
02:40But actually even like amongst that, you can't pick out why they're so good at this, so like
02:43passes per defensive action, which if you've not heard, you're sort of like how much you'll
02:47let the opposition do before you go in and try and win it back.
02:50So that stat and also total number of high turnovers and total number of shots coming
02:55from a high turnover, they're second because PSV are freaks.
02:58But the total number of goals coming from a high turnover, so how effectively they're
03:03doing this, being that the objective is to score goals, they're still top at that.
03:08They are the best at this, even if they're not the most at this, and this is like a perfect
03:12little example of it here because looking at it at the start, you wouldn't say the opposition
03:15are going to feel particularly like constrained, they're not going to feel like a man is sitting
03:19on their chest.
03:20But as soon as the ball goes out to the area that Feyenoord want to target, bang, everybody
03:25comes alive.
03:26They close off the passing lanes, the midfielders jump and lock on to any sort of out balls,
03:30they turn it over and they get a goal.
03:32But quite impressively, actually, they don't just do that for the sake of doing it.
03:35If they find the opposition are playing through them, if their attempts to target a weak spot
03:39aren't really working, they're not afraid to drop into this like Arteta style 4-4-2
03:44mid-block and try and see if the opposition can play over them or through them.
03:48Given the pace they have in the back line, that tends not to be too much of a worry for
03:52them.
03:53So they're very adaptable with their approach, and that will become a theme.
03:57But here is where like most of the Liverpool comparisons end and the sort of like De Zerbe
04:02via Guardiola ones begin, because there was a lot of talk even during his playing days,
04:06he would watch a lot of Pep's Guardiola.
04:07He loved this idea of controlled possession at the back, bringing the opposition onto
04:12you and then playing through them quite quickly.
04:14And that has kind of been his ethos at Feyenoord and Alkmaar as much as possible.
04:19Now, the key to a lot of what they do is, and I'm almost certainly going to get this
04:22wrong, Mats Vrijver.
04:25My Dutch is not good.
04:28Now when they've got a 4-2-3 one, he tends to sit as either of the pivots.
04:31When they use a 4-3-3 instead, he sometimes is the deepest one in that three, but other
04:36times he can be the eight as well.
04:39Then Slot tends to adapt where he is in that midfield, depending on how best they're going
04:44to use him.
04:45And as a result, if you just lob all his heat maps on top of each other, this is the story
04:50of his season.
04:52He's absolutely vital to everything they do.
04:54I don't know what the Dutch for f***ing everywhere is, but that's where he plays.
04:58But his most important part of this system by a mile is to be that first pass out of
05:03defence.
05:04If you've watched Brighton, maybe not in the last couple of months, but certainly last
05:08season, when they were good at doing things, that bounce pass out of defence to just quickly
05:13open up the build-up, he's amazing at that.
05:15So even when it is a 4-2-3-1, they'll split to this sort of back three with a goalkeeper.
05:20He'll get involved to help draw another player onto him.
05:22Then they'll sort of stagger the lines of the midfield, so it becomes somewhere between
05:27a 4-2-3-1 and a 4-3-3 anyway.
05:29The idea being that when they can get the ball into Vypher, it just bounces off him
05:34into a player that can get out of that trap.
05:37And that's hard, like not just for him, but as a way a team has to function.
05:42So sometimes they'll stick him in the eight because there's too much pressure there.
05:45But either way, that's what they're trying to do.
05:47They want you to come onto them so they can get through you as quickly as possible.
05:51Like if you can bring yourself to cast your mind back to last season, even though it was
05:54like what, four billion years ago, that bounce pass out of the defence was like the trademark
06:00deserby move.
06:02Slots brought it into this team brilliantly.
06:04Just to illustrate how effective that is, Feyenoord have the most touches of the ball
06:09in the Eredivisie.
06:10Again, ignoring the PSV freak show, but they also have the lowest number of touches in
06:15the defensive penalty area and the lowest percentage of their touches in the defensive
06:19third full stop.
06:20So they get out of there so quickly, but hang on.
06:23So do West Ham.
06:24Adam West Ham get out of the defensive third really quickly, Everton get out of the defensive
06:28third really quickly, Burnley get out of the defensive third really quickly.
06:32Yes, great points, all of them.
06:34But Feyenoord do so with having the lowest number of long passes in the league.
06:39They work their way out every single time, almost.
06:42Anyway, yes.
06:43So once they've worked their way out of the defensive third, they've got themselves into
06:46the attacking third.
06:47How do they then get at teams?
06:49And I think this might be the thing I've seen the most inconsistent disagreements over in
06:57all the stuff I've read and watched.
07:01There's no set way.
07:03Now you may, over the coming weeks and months, see stuff about how they will invert their
07:07fullbacks.
07:08And that's really good news for Trent Alexander-Arnold, but you also might read stuff about how their
07:11fullbacks have to provide all the width because they also invert their forwards.
07:15That's bad news for Trent Alexander-Arnold, but good news for Conor Bradley.
07:18And likewise, there's loads of stuff about how this sort of inverted winger and overlapping
07:23fullback is designed to A, get cutbacks into the box from the fullback or to get in swinging
07:28crosses on the strong foot of the inverted winger into the box.
07:31But also at the same time, they don't do this.
07:33They don't even pen teams in.
07:34They sit deep and they want to play through balls through the middle.
07:37And the thing is, it's all true.
07:40If you go through a selection of Feyenoord's highlights this season, you will see no shortage
07:44whatsoever of fullbacks getting to the byline and providing these cutbacks for tap-ins for
07:49the attackers.
07:50But also rather than running into the box, those same attackers will drop into more of
07:54a central area, put these crosses in at the back post for late runners, either from wide
07:58or from central.
07:59And what is weird is that given that those are traits you associate with possession teams,
08:03like think about how many times you've seen that cutback from Manchester City, because
08:06the only way they can get in round the back.
08:09They also are leading the league in this season for the number of through balls.
08:13So they attack the space as well.
08:15And the reason for that, and I think the main thing I want to try and get across with this
08:18video is there's a reason you've never heard the term slot ball.
08:23And it's not just because it sounds incredibly dirty, it's because there is not one clear
08:27defined part of play that Arnie Slott has in his team.
08:31Like if we look at the Dutch league stats from last season, Feyenoord were the number
08:34one crossers in that division, whether it was a low one from the byline, a swinging
08:39one from a slightly more central area, they loved to cross the ball into the box and scored
08:44loads of goals that way.
08:45But if we look at this season, they've dropped right the way down to mid-table and that's
08:50not normally like a characteristic of a team's attack.
08:53You ever expect to see that sort of drop off unless they're suddenly really bad.
08:58Like they've stayed good, they've stayed scoring goals, they're just scoring very different
09:01ones.
09:02And likewise, the previous season, the number of through balls, splitting the defence, getting
09:05somebody in behinds, they were pretty average at that, not spectacular at all for the number
09:10of goals they were scoring.
09:11In this season, they're by far and away the best team at doing it.
09:15And that's kind of all you really need to know about Arnie Slott as a manager.
09:19There's elements of Liverpool's old high pressing style and the way they are off the
09:23ball, but there's also elements of like that nice Arsenal 4-4-2 block that exists.
09:28And they also play a little bit like De Zerby when they're coming out from the back, but
09:32they're a little bit more direct with it.
09:34He's basically assembled like all the best bits of sort of recent football tactical innovation
09:39because that's what's going to be effective for this Feyenoord side.
09:43I don't actually know how helpful this graph is going to be.
09:45I may not even put this in the video, but whatever.
09:48This is Opta's team sequence styles graph that they have for the Premier League.
09:52Now in the bottom right, you have slow and intricate teams that are not looking to move
09:56the ball up the field quickly.
09:57They have a lot of passes.
09:58They basically kill you with their possession.
10:00In the very top left, you have teams that just want to get the ball forward as quickly
10:04as possible with the fewest number of passes, basically long ball sides that will sit deep
10:09defensively and then try and hit you really quickly.
10:12And quite predictably, that puts Liverpool right here.
10:15So they will have loads more of the ball than these teams that are sitting really defensively,
10:20but they're also way faster moving up the pitch.
10:22They're way more aggressive than the likes of a Man City or Brighton.
10:26Now obviously it's not the same league.
10:28This is not a perfect way of doing this, but let's just me and you have a fun game, right?
10:32Put your finger on the screen right now for where you think Feyenoord would be in terms
10:39of their play style on this graph, comparative to the Premier League teams.
10:43I'm going to give you 10 of these Earth seconds to have a little think about it.
10:47Remember, you keep hearing how similar they are to Liverpool.
10:50He does bits of this.
10:51He does bits of that.
10:52Finger on the screen now.
10:53Where's it going to go?
10:57Now, you might be looking at that thinking that how close it is to Liverpool is quite
11:01interesting, but I'm looking at that and I'm thinking how close it is to the exact Premier
11:07League average play style it is, is interesting.
11:11Is that English?
11:11You can pick out virtually any interesting aspect of a modern football team style of
11:15play and you can kind of find it somewhere in Feyenoord.
11:19Like Slott has done that over the course of his time at the club through coaching.
11:24Like they've not spent any money.
11:25He's just sort of really got a handle on football at the minute and has Feyenoord playing an
11:31awful lot of it.
11:32And on this coaching side, you're probably also going to hear a lot about the similarities
11:35between him and Ange Postakoglou.
11:37Like he's meant to be a sensational man manager.
11:40He really believes in sort of empowering players to get more out of them on the pitch.
11:44He's even quoted himself as saying that he wants to win the match in the days prior to
11:50it on the training ground.
11:51And actually, one thing I think will be particularly interesting to Liverpool fans is he's got
11:54a really good track record of converting players from like one position or role into a completely
12:01different one.
12:01Like Giatrida here is usually deployed right back, but he's had several performances at
12:06centre-back this season.
12:07And in the Ajax game, probably his best performance of the season, he was the left back.
12:11We've already talked about how he has numerous different roles across the midfield.
12:14Jakubu Minta, who's on loan from Newcastle, Ojoi and Vanasek.
12:18They've both played absolutely everywhere across these four front attacking position.
12:23Frengs, I think, has been used deep and central and wide.
12:27He's got the team, again, I can't keep stressing this enough, very adaptable to what they need
12:32to do.
12:32However, there are two consistence, I think, in the sort of the way he plays both this
12:38season and last season and even a little bit at Alkmaar, which are very important for two
12:45Liverpool players.
12:46One bad, one good.
12:47So first off, as a centre-back doing slot ball, that's never, ever going to catch on.
12:52You need to be supremely comfortable receiving the ball on the half turn, receiving the ball
12:58under pressure, playing it forward under duress.
13:02And, yep, Liverpool fans, you know exactly who I'm going to mention here.
13:04Canate is a brilliant defender, but that's not necessarily where his real skill set is.
13:13You could see him in sort of like a Brighton or a Man City system being a little bit limited
13:17in that regard.
13:18Now, obviously, Van Dijk's physical decline or lack thereof, that feels like a whole other
13:23video, isn't really so much of an issue here.
13:26He's really good on the ball.
13:27He would be class here.
13:29And also, Gerald Kwanzaa is an option.
13:31So is Joe Gomez.
13:32But you would imagine if they're going to spend any big bucks when slot comes in, it
13:36might be on another ball-playing centre-back.
13:38One issue they will not have, and something I'm personally quite excited to see, is that
13:42when they've sort of played out and they've gone from their 4-2-3-1 into now this 4-3-3,
13:47whoever was sort of the 10 in this situation tends to not have like the attacking onus
13:53on them.
13:53They sort of drop out a little bit to sort of pull defenders around, create that space.
13:57And the other eight, it's then their job to sort of get into this more attacking area.
14:03This is something he's been fairly consistent on for a number of years now.
14:07And I think, honest to God, Dominik Sobozlai will win the ball on door doing a job like
14:13that.
14:13Like, I think he's been really good this season, but three goals and two assists in the league
14:17is just like indicative of the fact he's not allowed to influence the game in the areas
14:22he really wants to.
14:23Like when Liverpool tend to have this thing going on, Salah moves in the middle and it's
14:26his job to get out from the right side of number eight, keep the width.
14:29And obviously he's on his right foot then, so he's doing crosses and playing in.
14:33And sometimes you'll just sort of meander into here, but he's never really sort of the
14:36attacking focal point.
14:37And I just think putting him in that system on the opposite side where he's going to want
14:42to get in there, heaven.
14:44And also, whispered this bit, but were there suddenly to be a vacancy on the right-hand
14:50side of the forward line, it could also maybe play there as well, although I don't know
14:55why that would happen.
14:58Now, whenever this does finally get Robert stamped, I don't know how managers contracts
15:01work.
15:02We will do another video looking exactly at how slot will likely sell Liverpool, what
15:07players he's probably going to want to keep, where they need to make transfers, that kind
15:10of thing.
15:10So if you are a Liverpool fan, you're looking forward to that, please do subscribe to us
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15:51Latest issue of the mag.
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15:59Hope you enjoyed the little gag that's been running in the background the whole video.
16:03Let me know if you spotted that and I'll see you soon.
16:07Bye.