Arne Slot explains what he did not expect from Liverpool - ' I could go on and on'

Slot

Arne Slot does not believe his new-look Liverpool are ahead of schedule - despite winning all five games of the new campaign so far.

The Premier League champions entertain Everton in the 247th Merseyside derby on Saturday lunchtime with a number of signings set to have their first taste of the fixture having joined during the summer transfer window.

The Reds have a perfect league record so far, seeing off Bournemouth, Newcastle United, Arsenal and Burnley, before Diego Simeone's Atletico Madrid were beaten 3-2 in the Champions League on Wednesday night.

Despite a summer turnover that saw nine players signed and 10 leave, Slot stopped short of claiming his team are exceeding internal expectations, saying:

Slot "Nah, that depends on when you ask me.

"When you ask me, maybe in May, I would expect us to be [up there], what happened to Diogo [Jota] wasn't known then, I was expecting Alexis McAllister to start in pre-season from day one, but things got worse.

"I think the main thing in the beginning of the season is picking up points, and I think we did this better than, in general, people speak about, if I have to listen to you.

"Because I think people don't take into account how difficult it is to win at Newcastle away, after all that happened.

“Arsenal at home, I think they haven't conceded a goal, only against us. Burnley conceded only 14 goals last season, and I could go on and on.

"So if you take all that into account, everything that happened, the change we had to make, players are not all ready to play 90 minutes, which is for many clubs the situation, then we are further definitely in points than I expected us to be."

Liverpool spent close to £70m this summer on a new full-back pairing in £29m Jeremie Frimpong and the £40m Milos Kerkez.

The duo have been competing for minutes with Conor Bradley and Andy Robertsonrespectively and explaining the rotation at full-back, the Reds boss

Slot added: “The reason why we've changed so much in that position as all to do with the fitness of the players.

"Jeremie was out for three or four weeks. If he even runs two yards, he's already sprinting because of how he fast is.

"We have to be quite cautious about him. That's why I took him off after 60 minutes. Conor Bradley has quite a history last season because he can only play at 150 miles an hour.

"With three games in seven days again, think we have to manage that as well.

“But I think this season, I've said this before, I think when I look at the squad, we are stronger than we were last season.

"We still have to show if you can talk about the first XI. If they are stronger, that's what we have to wait and see. But the squad is stronger and last season, that's what we tried to achieve.

"And therefore, we will utilise the squad also more. Because it's not only about if I would have played Jeremie 90 minutes and I would play him tomorrow 90 minutes again, the chance of him being injured is seriously there.

"But the example of Milos and Robbo, if I every time play Milos and then Milos gets injured and then all of a sudden Robbo has to play six or seven games in a row, then he's not prepared for that.

"So I need to give him, in this example, also playing time. He played twice for the national team, so for the moment something happens, he's ready to play.

"And the good thing is everyone is so close to each other that I can make that choice."

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