Alexis Mac Allister can have a footballing eloquence. His job involves reading the game. He is an elegant realist of a footballer but he may have underestimated a team. His own. “Ask me before the season I wouldn’t say we were [title] candidates but now it looks like so we are,” said the World Cup winner. With a five-point lead at the third international break, it is increasingly undeniable.
Are they favourites? They wouldn’t say so, and not merely because they have appointed a manager less likely to make headlines with his rhetoric. Liverpool have the experience of spending more days top of the table last season than anyone else. It felt a footnote when Manchester City became champions again.
Arne Slot rationalised Liverpool’s exceptional run of 15 wins in 17 games by arguing that City, Arsenal and Chelsea could do likewise. The evidence is most slender in the case of the new-look Chelsea. City’s history indicates they can; the question is whether they are still the relentless winning machine of old. For now, however, Liverpool are the great anomaly among England’s quartet of Champions League clubs. City and Aston Villa have both lost their last four games in all competitions, Arsenal three of four.
All of which could mean a similar slump awaits Liverpool; if so, the standings would take on a different look. Slot’s calmness should suggest he is less reliant on momentum than more emotional managers but thus far, the combination of the Premier League’s competitiveness and the draining nature of a cramped fixture list makes it seem feasible that everyone will have a difficult patch. Maybe the title will be decided by consistency more than brilliance.
And yet, perceptions have shifted in a period that could have seen them stumble. After the soft landing of Slot’s start, Liverpool’s last seven matches were against Chelsea, RB Leipzig, Arsenal, Brighton, Brighton again, Bayer Leverkusen and Villa. They got six wins and a draw. Four of the next five are against Real Madrid, City and away at Newcastle and Everton. Thus far, they have passed the tests: sometimes superbly, sometimes by doing enough. That five of their victories have come by one-goal margins shows they have not always been dramatically better.
But they have been resolute, with a mere 10 goals conceded in those 15 matches. The blend of Jurgen Klopp and Slot is reflected by a greater solidity while retaining the German’s capacity for comebacks: Liverpool have trailed to AC Milan, West Ham, Arsenal and Brighton, beating three, drawing in the other game.
So is it sustainable? Slot has lent improvement to Ibrahima Konate and Ryan Gravenberch in particular. There is a question if each can extend autumnal form across an entire campaign or if they are just early-season overachievers.
Liverpool have been comparatively untroubled by injuries but they have made light of two potentially damaging losses. Caoimhin Kelleher’s terrific double save from Amadou Onana and Diego Carlos on Saturday reinforced his status as the best second-choice goalkeeper around, though Slot has underlined that Alisson remains his No 1. Diogo Jota is sadly injury-prone but Luis Diaz has a hat-trick as a stand-in striker and Darwin Nunez deputised in idiosyncratic but effective fashion against Villa.
Fortunately, the prospect of Conor Bradley having to prove a right-back version of Kelleher has receded with the positive news concerning the injury that forced Trent Alexander-Arnold off against Villa. The vice-captain could be fit for the Champions League clash with Real Madrid and is expected to be back for the Premier League meeting with champions Manchester City at the latest. However, he is set to miss England’s Nations League games against Greece and Republic of Ireland this week.
Thus far, Slot has been able to rely on a relatively small core. It feels as though his preferred line-up has only altered twice this season: in August, when Konate dislodged Jarell Quansah from defence and more recently, when the in-form Curtis Jones may have leapfrogged Dominik Szoboszlai in midfield. In Cody Gakpo and Kostas Tsimikas, he has two adept deputies on the left flank but only 16 Liverpool players have played more than 150 minutes in the Premier League this season; if injuries bite, the men who figure between 17th and 22nd in Slot’s thoughts may have to prove pivotal.
Smiling yet demanding, the Dutchman has provided a clarity of thought and a seamless capacity to work with the players he inherited. If January could be an opportunity to shape Slot’s side, if there could yet be a need for a defensive midfielder to occupy the role envisaged for Martin Zubimendi, Liverpool have had few reasons so far to regret the Spaniard’s decision to stay at Real Sociedad. And while it is easy to say the expiring contracts of Mohamed Salah, Virgil van Dijk and Alexander-Arnold could prove a distraction, that has not been the case to date.
Instead, Liverpool have started at a pace that puts them on course to get 97 points; which, in 2018-19, Klopp did. The class of 2024-25 will not post the same number but then again, they are not competing with their past. And if the stumbles of their rivals have propelled Liverpool into such a fine position, they are giving reasons to believe they could stay there.
