Arne Slot a ‘human blobfish’ in charge of ‘stultifyingly bobbins’ Liverpool

One of Arne Slot’s problems in keeping Liverpool fans onside is his personality, which is amplified because of Jurgen Klopp.

We also have mails on Arsenal, Man Utd, AFCON and Donald Trump. Mail your views to theeditor@football365.com

Arne Slot is a human blobfish

I know what Ian H in the Monday morning mailbox is saying – I was wondering the same with a mate after the inevitable failure to beat Burnley at home on Saturday – personally I think we should stick with Slot until the end of the season, not just because of the league win last year, but also for the following main reasons:

The impossibility of following Klopp – clearly I am biased, which doesn’t stop it being true: Klopp is a singular figure – one of a kind – an incredible, unique human being, a really inspirational proven winner and all round heroically good guy – would be great down the pub, always get his round in, an amazing listener and bubbling with the best stories. Insert your personal grievances and examples of being a poor loser here but every manager has those – I suspect everybody would love him to manage their club, particular with the current rogue’s gallery across the Prem.

Contrast that with Slot – literally a human blobfish. The only thing more mind-numbingly tedious and soporific than his Liverpool team’s tactics and performances are his post-match interviews and the interminable and infernal reasonableness eminating from that featureless, shiny orb seemingly hovering above his shoulders. Throw some fecking furniture Arne – you’re making that half a billion pounds look like it was spent on valium!

Logically it was always going to nigh-on impossible to follow Klopp – literally anybody was going to be a step down, in personality, football, results, trophies, exceitement, just vibes. So give the Blob the season and hopefully the difference will be less stark next season (last season doesn’t count as the Title stopped Pool fans noticing the difference).

Secondly, too much change and too many injuries means the team isn’t playing anywhere near its potential – yes yes every team has these, but how many times has changing the manager miraculously fixed everything? Well apart from Saturday and the arrival of the Messiah Michael of course – United fans, never change. More often that not, changing the manager just makes things worse – every club has painful examples; it is pretty much a constant outcome. If Pool are still as stultifyingly bobbins by January next year then that is the time to move him on.

Thirdly, Alonso is no guarantee of success – he won’t have the same perfect storm of success that he had at Leverkusen, and no other manager is guaranteed to be any better than Slot. Protest votes and change for change’s sake rarely go well. Trump is hopefully making that clear enough to everyone, even the most myopic of Americans, but if not we will get taught our lesson when Farage tears up the rulebook and down society when he can prioritise his bilionaire funders over those who elected him.

Paul McDevitt (always a consistently erudite and thought-provoking mailboxer) raises some interesting points too – personally I think City will get another 100 point season or two in future, in fact such is their inoculation from any kind of scrutiny of their illegal funding and ref incentivising, I expect they will find a way to get to 115! Arf. Joking aside, they do have one of the best squads but more importantly the best manager – if Pep leaves then they will have to start again, and then 100 might be impossible, but with him there it is always a possibility.

In terms of whether the league is better or worse, or the best or the worst, really this is a moot point. Objectively – you want a competitive league. Subjectively – you want your team to win every game. Clearly you can’t have both. The wider constantly worseningly world and the incessant impossibility of escaping it, due to technology’s neverending and insidious infiltration and ultimately annexation of every moment of human consciousness (seriously everybody give up social media, and leave your phone in your pocket once in a while – your lives will improve exponentially) means that nobody is capable of enjoying anything ever. Everybody is on a doom loop like a dog constantly chasing their tail, which is actually a rage firecracker stuck up their bumhole.

That’s why Arsenal fans are saying they won’t win the league with “the rubbish we have up front” despite Lego Pulis devising a gameplan specifically to remove the requirement for any kind of form from any kind of attacking players – all they need is decent dead-ball delivery and referees to keep ignoring their incessant fouling around the keeper on set pieces. No shade meant here Gooners – Champions (and you will be) alway find something to exploit that the rest of the league hasn’t yet. El Pulizon’s purchase of Viking Clogger (shout Stuey) is just to fool Arse fans into thinking he gives a solitary sh*t about attacking football – he doesn’t, and neither will you when you win the league.

Sorry this turned into a bit of a ramble, without any Swiss-style mitigation, have a great week everybody!
Gofezo (apologies to Blobfish everywhere)

Did Liverpool cock it on Marc Guehi?

Normally I’m in agreement with much of F365’s output, speaking truth to power etc, but the latest piece on how FSG have had their pants pulled down over Guehi is a bit rich for my blood: clearly they should have signed another defender in the summer – but they did sign an excellent Centre Half in Leoni, deemed to be an excellent prospect, future Italy star etc. So that’s one Centre Half, plus Gomez, who on the brief moments he’s fit, is excellent. Two nailed on starters in Ibou and Virgil.

Despite all that, they still had a deal in place with Palace, only for Glasner to lose his mind and for a replacement deal at their end to fall through. That happens.

Clearly there was a deal in place for Guehi to come on a free in the summer, but if City come in, splashing the cash, offering Palace 20 million they weren’t otherwise going to get AND Guehi all the money he was going to make as a free transfer plus 300k a week, plus guaranteed starting spot and a realistic chance of a trophy – how is he going to turn that down? I don’t think you can lay the blame on FSG for that..
Dan, London

Can you win the Premier League AND bottle it?

After the weekend’s Arsenal result, a question: Is it possible to bottle the title and also win it? Perhaps this year…
Adam, LFC

Arsenal campaign is a marathon, not a sprint

With the caveat that I’m obviously also disappointed we couldn’t get the win against Forest, I don’t think there is any reason to panic yet that we’re going to draw our way into collapse.

Primary reason – we’re still creating a lot of good chances and can’t expect every team we come up against to have a MOTM goalkeeper. Forest have played every big team really well this year and have the midfield (Sangare, Anderson, Dominguez) to really go toe to toe with anyone physically. That all of them are being praised for locking Arsenal down tells you that we came across a team playing their A game, who still created nothing and had 0 shots on target.

Second, Arsenal put their heroic/overwhelming performance in earlier in the week against Chelsea (ok, there are definitely also criticisms that we didn’t put the tie to bed, but the performance was dominating) and getting up for two games a week is just plain hard regardless. With two weeks of CL games we don’t have to win, I’m really hoping Arteta elects for the A-team to turn the screw on United next weekend and Leeds the week after.

City are in the same camp and are seemingly deflating rapidly and we know Villa are really struggling now with the injuries that Arsenal have ridden out.

It’s disappointing we couldn’t make it 11 points gap from these last two games, but 7 points really is still something to be very positive about still – muscle memory might be worrying City go on ‘one of those runs’ but truthfully, this City team look inferior player for player (even against their former selves) from the behemoth of two years ago who ground us down and won out.

If we start losing games, then it’s time to worry.
Tom, Leyton

Grading Arsenal players

Seven points clear at top of PL, top and qualified in the CL, one foot in the league cup final and in the next stage of FA Cup. Decided to do a review of how each of our players are performing. It’s very strange because we’ve been quite poor in a lot of games this season but have been lucky City aren’t on it.

Raya – 8. Reliable and offers so much. His ability to catch the ball is amazing. Comes through with some amazing saves. Sometimes his distribution can be risky but that’s how he’s told to play. He can have games where he doesn’t have to do much but he’s nearly been faultless.

Kepa – 6. Good backup to have. Obviously a downgrade to Raya but hasn’t been much of a problem.

White – 5. Fitness issues because he was played to the ground when Timber and Tomiyasu were injured. He’s had some good moments and some bad. It’s hard to get up to speed when you keep picking up knocks. Still a player I rate highly if hes fit.

Timber – 9. Brilliant. Always gives opposition wingers a tough time. Great at carrying the ball.

Mosquera – 7. He’s been good and a bargain. Injured for a good while now though. Quite a trend.

Saliba – 8. He has a few shaky moments on the ball but he’s still elite.

Gabriel – 9. Nothing to say. Best player.

Hincapie – 7. Done well when played. No issues.

Calafiori – 8. Had my doubts last season. People were able to get past him quite easily. Massively improved in that area and is obviously brilliant going forward. Another player who is a bit of a sick note.

MLS – 3. He’s been awful. I worried last season he wasn’t a great defender. I don’t think he’s good enough yet to play midfield. He’s in an awkward position. Seems to have lost all confidence.

Zubimendi – 9. Great addition. His relationship with Rice is amazing

Rice – 9. Thought he was poor for most of last season. He didn’t start this season off well either but he’s vital for us.

Norgaard – 5. Fine.

Odegaard – 6. I’m finding it hard to even remember what he was like when he was good. He is so lightweight and he’s not really been important for us in a long while. If he doesn’t get his act together it’s a problem.

Eze – 5.5. Odegaard not playing well is an issue because Eze isn’t either. I would prefer Eze off the left in Rice position but he needs to earn it. He just doesn’t get much of the ball. He’s been very underwhelming. It’s like Grealish to City all over again.

Merino – 6. Way better as a striker. Dives a lot and constantly plays it safe instead of moving the ball forward. Still a good squad player.

Nwaneri – 4. Not given any chances. I like his directness. He must not be impressing in training.

Saka – 7. His overall gameplay is good. If you watch Arsenal you will see this. But his output has been dreadful, a common issue under Arteta. He’s taking a lot of ambitious shots.

Madueke – 5.5. Similar to Saka. Madueke tries to do too much. His output is dreadful.

Martinelli – 6. Our top scorer in all comps. 1 PL goal. He can’t dribble or shoot well. His final year next season unless we renew him. Think his time is up. He’s a good bench option as he’s proven many times.

Trossard – 8. Good season from him. Our best finisher. Find him frustrating cause he holds on to the ball so long and often in our own half.

Jesus – 5. He’s been injured so don’t want to be too harsh but he will never be a scorer. Got 95 goals for City but he’s not that player anymore. Spends half the game in midfield for some reason.

Gyokeres – 3. Hasn’t been good enough. Doesn’t look capable of becoming good enough either.

Our defence is doing their part. We seem very predictable going forward. It’s a nightmare to be a CF in this team too imo.
Dion Byrne

Ruben Amorim was not struggling because of AFCON

I was going to write a long mail about Amorim and United, but I haven’t got round to it yet (Too late now; please don’t – Ed). But in the meantime, can everyone (and especially Jon in Capetown) stop pretending that Amorim was hamstrung by injuries and AFCON. It’s just nonsense, and a blatant misrepresentation of the actual events. In the 7 matches prior to players leaving for AFCON, United won 2 of 7, against the following sides:

Bournemouth – D (they’d lost 4 of their last 6 before playing us)
Wolves – W (worst PL side ever at that point)
West Ham – D (already relegated basically)
Palace – W (this was a good win, as they were in better form than they are now)
Everton – L (13th at the time and had 10 men almost the whole game)
Spurs – D (need I say more?)
Forest – D (hovering around relegation spots at the time)

To claim that United were struggling because of absentees is false. To claim that we would have automatically been better on their return is false. It’s just lazy moronic nonsense. Stop saying it. Before AFCON we’d W7 D5 L4 for the season. Form was very patchy.

I was never ‘Amorim out’, I was ‘Amorim needs to win some bloody football matches’ and unfortunately he didn’t do that enough. Was it going to get better? Maybe, but there really weren’t any signs that it would have done.

That said, the real test for Carrick and United will be how we get on against teams who sit back at put 10 behind the ball, because Amorim was completely beaten by this strategy. The only difference injuries made here is that we didn’t see a Plan B of Harry Maguire being played up front in half a dozen games this season.

Fantastic win for United. I knew we had some good players.
AS Camden

READ: Premier League winners and losers: Manchester United, cursed Emery, Wilson, Arsenal and more…

AFCON: Just a lot of fun

A couple of mails slagging off the AFCON final earlier. However, it’s the most entertained I’ve been by a football match for a long time. Manchester derby aside, the other three televised Premiership games yielded 1 goal, and very little entertainment. This game had (from 85 mins on):

A disallowed goal for Senegal.
Penalty for Morocco.
Senegal players leaving the pitch in disgust.
Terrible panenka penalty.
Extra time.
Lovely winning goal.
Open goal miss.

It’s supposed to be fun guys, let’s enjoy it.
Simon S, NUFC, Cheshire

READ: Brahim Diaz’s Panenka penalty only the second weirdest thing about AFCON final…

…Ahhhh AFCON.

Nobody really cared about it much but that final was surely scripted by Vince McMahon. I just put the last 10 minutes on and wow !

Firstly, the disallowed goal for Senegal from the corner early into injury time was never a foul. VAR couldn’t overrule it because the ref blew for a foul instantly denying any chance of a review. Poor officiating goal should have stood.

Secondly the penalty, Diaz makes an absolute meal of that and goes bonkers looking for the officials to review it. As the ref is looking at the monitor he’s surround by all 427 staff, subs and officials from both teams. Gives it, madness ensues. Senegal aren’t happy, and there’s more hand gesturing than an Italian at a sign language convention going on. They’re clearly pointing towards the recently disallowed goal down the other end, conversing in I dont know what language???? English is that common for both countries? French? Arabic?

I read somewhere earlier Diaz said he missed on purpose because it didn’t feel right to score! Absolute box office if true. He kissed the ball, stared dead pan and focused at it the whole time Mendy and his consorts were faffing around and at no point did he indicate to Mendy he’d chip it to him.

Then, to cap it all off, my friend, your friend, Mr “today i’m gay/black/trans/a toaster” awards Diaz with his golden boot as if the poor bastard needed that helmet anywhere near him!

Can’t wait for the 2027 edition and the revenge of Morocco !!!! They’re surely scripting it now.
Gibbo (MUFC – down under)

Should Europe boycott World Cup?

I don’t want to turn the mailbox into Pete and Bernie’s geopolitical steakhouse but, surely, with the US contemplating a military invasion of Greenland for literally no good reason, *all* European nations should now be making plans to boycott the 2026 World Cup.

Having gorged on as much of Russia 2018 and Qatar 2022 as possible, I’ve always been pretty ambivalent about the idea of quitting a tournament until now.

Now FIFA has made our sport a ‘political football’ in a way beyond Russia and Qatar with Gianni Infantino straining to maintain a level of toadishness that even Brandt from the Big Lebowski couldn’t reach.

A boycott would have huge consequences. UEFA has eight of the world’s top ten ranked teams and all ten of the highest-valued players. We could probably rally another dozen teams outside UEFA to join us.

Like many of you, I watched in horror as December’s big ball-drop devolved into batshit bingo as El Presidente cut some rug up in the nosebleeds.

And I have sympathy for the many Americans who find the screws being tightened in their police-state-data-cage. Plus the players – Haaland for example – who would miss the chance of a lifetime. Then there’s the Mexicans and Canadians who would have been delightful hosts. Maybe we can work out an alternative competition?

But as someone who supports a team with considerable – and successful – US backing and finds the actual American fans among the most knowledgeable, conversational football fans of the lot, I still ask the question.

We’ve just about weathered Murdoch, TikTok and half-and-half scarves. Is Trump and his money men the biggest threat to football in a generation?

As with the latest Blades and Wednesday merger rumours, they’re not going to stop, and they’re not going to learn, are they? At least not until Hillsborough is luxury flats and game 47 is held in Miami.

We are now seeing Superbowl style half-times (Copa America last year), league fixtures in other leagues getting transplanted, clear favouritism for ‘MVPs’ like Cristiano Ronaldo, and political meddling ‘for me, just not for thee’.

With the block vote of majority US-owned premier league clubs growing, we should be worried what strings they get asked to pull next.

Who’s with me…?
Quarantino (All I got for Christmas was a Semen Padang away kit), Chairman of the Bored, ITFC