Arne Slot is just a lucky general at Liverpool as ‘European giants’ forced into big change by FIFA

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Slot Klopp Liverpool
Will Arne Slot be the new Jurgen Klopp at Liverpool?

Arne Slot is not as good a Liverpool manager as Jurgen Klopp, but not for the obvious reason you might think, while The Sun are busy just redefining words to their own ends.

 

Slot luck
Mediawatch doesn’t really disagree with the central thrust of David Anderson’s piece in the Mirror, with the caveat that said central thrust is so facile and obvious that it absolutely does not need making.

Why Arne Slot’s rampaging Reds are not yet as good as Jurgen Klopp’s all-conquering Liverpool

Oh, we know this one. Is it because Klopp was there for eight years and won everything and also came second in a couple of ludicrous seasons against peak Man City, while Arne Slot has been manager for about five (enormously encouraging) minutes and thus hasn’t yet actually had the chance to win anything at all?

Well, yes and no. The main reason Slot’s Liverpool are not as good is apparently that he has been lucky. Lucky with injuries, lucky with the fixture list, lucky with Man City being all plop and that.

Like we say, it’s not wrong, as such. But it’s just trite. And a bit mean for no good reason. Of course they’re not as good yet as a team that achieved so much. There is literally no way they could be; but they have started just about as well as it’s possible to start.

And some of the arguments put forward to make what really should be the easiest and most obvious point imaginable are just guff.

Now take the summer and Slot inherited a very good side from Jurgen Klopp, one that was on course for a quadruple before they ran out of steam in mid-March.

A very good side? Absolutely yes. One that was on course for a quadruple before they ran out of steam? Sorry, but were they f***. Liverpool won the Carabao, yes, and remained in contention everywhere else but they were never better than third favourites for either the Premier League or Champions League and frankly nobody is ever really ‘on course’ for a quadruple until the very, very final moments because winning a quadruple almost never happens. Not in England, anyway.

It’s rare for a coach to take over a top side when they are still a force and look at Manchester United or Chelsea to see the difference that makes.

Rare, but not unheard of. We remember a coach taking over Manchester United when they’d just won the league – not trailed in third – and, well, that didn’t work out quite like this appears to be.

Liverpool have certainly had things fall their way this season, but let’s not pretend anyone predicted Slot or his team doing this well and then damn him with a comparison where he cannot possibly (yet) prevail.

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Giant Little Ones
Mediawatch accepts and, let’s be honest, very often embraces the need to draw people in by writing headline cheques the content cannot cash. But there are limits.

Without the context clues provided elsewhere, we honestly think we could give you 100 guesses at which club The Sun has described as a ‘European giant’ here without any of you getting it. And to be clear, none of that fault would rest with you, the intelligent and might we add devilishly handsome Mediawatch reader.

You might be able to guess it from the actual gist of the story, but with a reaction similar to Mediawatch’s own: ‘But surely they can’t just mean…’ Anyway, here we go.

NEW LOOK: Champions League club forced to change name and adopt new badge by Fifa

European giant is going by new moniker with Fifa also showing redesigned badge. It comes ahead of a major draw this week.

Yeah, there are some clues there. And yes, the European giant in question is indeed Red Bull Salzburg. They’re not even the biggest Red Bull ffs. They’re the light blue Red Bull.

It’s also barely a story anyway; all that’s happened is that – for the shiny new Club World Cup – FIFA are following UEFA’s Champions League lead and officially referring to them as FC Salzburg for sponsorship reasons.

They’re still the same gigantic Red Bull Salzburg you all know and love in their other games.

 

Bull sh*t
Talking of Red Bull, some astonishing nonsense from the Daily Star here.

Now we’re sure by now that regular readers have worked out Mediawatch is quite partial to a Supercomputer. But where we absolutely draw the line is with the Star’s very weird and dizzyingly dystopian recent habit for asking ChatGPT stuff and then quoting its generically-dull-by-design responses as if they were actual words of wisdom from an actual expert or at the very least actual person.

Erik ten Hag and Jurgen Klopp could team up in Europe with their unlikely partnership poised to shake up the German football scene according to a supercomputer

We start with a bit of 2+2=5 with the idea that Red Bull Leipzig (the dark blue Red Bull) might sack Marco Rose after a tough run and replace him with Erik ten Hag. Fine, none of that is impossible. And with Jurgen Klopp’s new top-level role overseeing Red Bull’s football operations, yes, Mediawatch concedes the idea of former Liverpool and United managers working together is a fun one.

But here is where it all falls down. Because the idea that this pairing could yield success is built entirely on one anodyne quote from ChatGPT. And worse, the Star know what weak sauce this is because they can’t even bring themselves to reveal it until the last possible moment after paragraphs and paragraphs of filler and wibble.

Eventually, though, we get to the good stuff.

Bayern Munich have been so dominant in recent years, bar the incredible season from Bayer Leverkusen last year. Ten Hag will have to prove that he can challenge for Leipzig’s first ever League title quickly.

The key thing is that this is exactly what the supercomputer predicts Klopp and Ten Hag can do. To use the words of the advanced AI system, it said: “This collaboration could reinvigorate Leipzig and challenge the dominance of Bayern Munich, setting the stage for a new chapter in German football.”

Journalism is dead.

 

Pot luck
Another familiar and favourite Mediawatch game for you all to play along here, courtesy of the Express.

Graham Potter’s stance on replacing Julen Lopetegui after watching West Ham lose in person

You can already guess where this is heading.

Graham Potter has suggested that he would be open to taking over at West Ham United if Julen Lopetegui is sacked. The Spaniard is under growing pressure to save his job after overseeing a run of five Premier League games without a win.

As always, a shiny (if sadly fictitious) pound winging its way to the clever sausage who can tell us how many times Potter mentioned West Ham or Lopetegui when apparently ‘suggesting’ he would be open to taking said job.

Well done, you are all correct.

Grudging respect, though, to the Express hack who had the sheer brass balls to open his story with:

Graham Potter has suggested that he would be open to taking over at West Ham United if Julen Lopetegui is sacked.

…and then close it with:

It remains to be seen if he would be willing to take over at West Ham, with Lopetegui on increasingly thin ice at the London Stadium.

 

It’s the most wonderful time of the year

Of all times! Mediawatch is chortling twice here, because this has also reminded us of the magnificent ‘But it’s my birthday’ Trevor Francis sacking story.

 

 

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