Liverpool should hopefully see the official arrival of Arne Slot as their new manager this weekend.
The Dutch coach is set to begin his contract with the Reds on Saturday, and there’s plenty of work for him to get stuck into.
Obviously, the Liverpool squad aren’t expected back for at least another month, but Slot will likely be settling in at the AXA Training Centre ahead of their return.
After almost a decade of Jurgen Klopp occupying the manager’s office at the training ground, it will be strange to have a new sheriff in town.
Slot is obviously brining a few new faces for the coaching team with him as well, and they’ll have their own distinct way of doing things. According to pundit Darren Bent though, the 45-year-old needs to be careful in his early days with Liverpool.
Darren Bent warns Arne Slot against ‘biggest mistake’
There will have been a fair pile of things stacking up on Slot’s desk on Saturday morning.
The former Feyenoord head coach has been left in a pretty good situation by Klopp, but there’s still a lot to be done.
Given that we’re now in full summer mode, most of this will pertain to transfer targets. There’s also the small matter of a few ‘dangerous’ contract situations to sort out.
Away from footballing matters though, Slot will merely want to get acclimatised to his new surroundings.
There will perhaps be a willingness to stamp his own mark on things at the AXA and to tear up what the old regime were doing. But according to Bent, Slot needs to tread very carefully with this.
“The biggest mistake he can make and I hope he doesn’t do it, well I kind of do because I’m an Arsenal fan, but what I hope he doesn’t do is what I heard David Moyes did [at Man United]. He came in and tried to change everything,” the former England striker told TalkSPORT.
“Like the menu, things like that. If he comes in Arne Slot and slowly starts to tweak one or two things, change a little bit of this, little bit of that, I think it will have a better effect,” Bent adds. “But if he comes in day one and tries to be like ‘right I’m in charge now, no more this, no more that’ and the players have been used to it for the last decade. You can’t do it.”
When Liverpool could make signings under Arne Slot
It seems likely that we’ll hear from Slot for the first time as Liverpool head coach over the coming days.
Since Klopp’s exit earlier this month, things have been very lowkey around the new boss.
Liverpool put out a very short and simple announcement to signal his arrival, and we’ve heard nothing at all since.
But that doesn’t mean that Slot has not already been busy behind the scenes. According to journalist Graeme Bailey, he’ll already be working on signings.
The Euros could complicate matters, but Bailey claimed that new additions are likely to come sooner rather than later.
First things first though, and it will simply be great to see Slot getting down to work proper at Liverpool. A new era begins.