Why Arne Slot’s Team Selection vs Crystal Palace Proves He Still Believes Liverpool Can Win the Premier League

Arne Slot’s Liverpool lost to Crystal Palace for the third time this season on Wednesday night as the Eagles won 3-0 at Anfield to progress to the Carabao Cup quarter-finals.

Much has changed since Palace’s first victory over Liverpool, which came via a penalty shootout in the Community Shield in August.

Liverpool bounced back from that loss by winning their next seven matches in a row, before falling to a dramatic 2-1 defeat at Selhurst Park in the Premier League in late September.

Since then, Slot’s side have crumbled. Wednesday’s defeat was Liverpool’s sixth in their last seven games across all competitions.

Liverpool are seven points behind leaders Arsenal in the Premier League and now out of one of England’s two domestic cup competitions.

Arne Slot called “disrespectful” after Liverpool limp out of Carabao Cup

With Liverpool in their worst run of form since the mid-1990s — and calls for Arne Slot to be sacked growing from whispers to slightly louder grumbles — many fans expected Liverpool to name a strong team against Crystal Palace on Wednesday.

However, Slot instead opted to make 10 changes from the side that lost 3-2 at Brentford, while he left most of his senior stars out of the matchday squad completely.

Slot’s decision to fully drop the likes of Mo Salah, Virgil van Dijk, Hugo Ekitike, Cody Gakpo, Dominik Szoboszlai, Florian Wirtz and Ibrahima Konate did not go down well with many Liverpool fans.

Some felt his team selection was “disrespectful”. Not just to Crystal Palace and the Carabao Cup, but to the 60,420 supporters who turned up to Anfield to watch the game.

One disgruntled supporter wrote on social media: “Slot has to apologise to the fans in the stadium for tonight, the way he’s treating them is completely disrespectful.

“One thing is to give a chance to the kids in the cup, completely different is to humiliate the club with his reckless strategies.”

Another fan fumed: “Worst game of football I have ever watched. The disrespect Slot has shown this cup & the fans tonight with this team is absolutely not acceptable!”

A tweet from a different fan read: “I’m not sack Slot yet but after putting out that team to 60,000 Reds. If he loses v Villa & in midweek after the first team being rested we will be out of the League Cup & Prem struggling in the Champions League.”

Arne Slot’s Carabao Cup team selection proves he still thinks Liverpool can win the Premier League

While many fans were frustrated at Arne Slot for seemingly throwing away a chance at silverware by fielding a severely weakened starting XI and bench against Crystal Palace, his team selection strongly suggested that he still believes Liverpool can retain their Premier League title this season.

If Slot genuinely felt that Liverpool were out of the Premier League title race then it would have made sense for him to go all guns blazing in the Carabao Cup.

But from his lineup on Wednesday it is clear that Slot’s priority is to get the Premier League campaign back on track with a victory over Aston Villa on Saturday.

That game comes just eight days before a crunch clash away at Manchester City, with a Champions League game against Real Madrid sandwiched in between.

If Liverpool’s rested superstars somehow find a way to get three wins out of those fixtures, then Slot’s dismissive approach to the Carabao Cup will perhaps be justified.

However, if they lose further ground in the title race in early November then Slot might find himself wishing he had shown the Carabao Cup — which some have argued is better than the FA Cup — a little more respect.

What Arne Slot said after Carabao Cup loss to Crystal Palace

In an attempt to explain why he had chosen to rest so many of his star players against Crystal Palace, Arne Slot claimed that Liverpool’s squad was “probably not as big as people think it is”.

Speaking to BBC Radio 5 Live, Slot said: “You have every option where you can choose from, but the reality is also that there is not a lot of reasons why we have lost five out of six.

“None of them are enough to make up for the fact we have lost so many. It is clear in the last few weeks we have always had to play two days after we played the last game after a difficult game in Europe.

“If you look at the week coming up, that is going to be a big week for us, everyone and the club. We need as many players available as we can. You can see today with the line-up I had to make. I only rested the players that have played mainly in the last week. This is the line-up you get. That shows you we already have a few injuries. With a big week coming up for me, it felt the best choice.

“Combined with that, this club has always chosen in the League Cup to give playing time to young academy players as well. Our squad is probably not as big as people think it is. There has not been a change in the way we look at this.”

Moaning about the size of his squad after spending close to half a billion pounds on new signings during a record-breaking summer transfer window is not a great look.

And although Slot appeared to suggest that the Carabao Cup has always been low on Liverpool’s list of priorities, there is no escaping that his team selection on Wednesday was weaker than it needed to be. Indeed, it was weaker than usual for such a game.

Liverpool blooded several youngsters in this competition last season, but they also fielded Mo Salah five times, including in a 5-1 thrashing of West Ham in round three.

Regardless of how he tries to package it, Slot chose to write off Liverpool’s Carabao Cup campaign this week. He still has his sights set on much bigger things.