Arne Slot makes winger transfer claim amid Mohamed Salah and Cody Gakpo Liverpool struggles

Gakpo and Salah

From a slow start, the hesitant defending, inconsistent conviction in midfield and a blunt attacking edge, there was plenty to dislike about Liverpool's performance in dismal defeat at Wolves on Tuesday.

But one matter that particularly irked Arne Slot by half-time was his team's inability to play the ball quickly enough to the flanks and give the Reds' wide players sufficient opportunity to run at their opponents

It highlighted a faultline that has run straight through Liverpool's creative efforts this season and, for Slot, is being echoed around the Premier League.

On the way to winning the title last year, the most profitable area of the pitch for the Reds was out wide, with Cody Gakpo contributing 10 goals in the competition and Mohamed Salah29.

Of Luis Diaz's 13, eight came when on the left flank.

This season, however, with Diaz gone, Gakpo and Salah have struggled to score from any position, the former netting only three times in 18 games while the latter's equaliser at Molineux was his first goal in 11 Premier League appearances.

Between then they have only nine assists. Salah alone managed 18 in the top-flight last term.

Given the shift towards towards serving a central striker following the summer purchases of Alexander Isak and Hugo Ekitike, some drop-off may have been expected from the wings. Across the league, though, there is a similar story regardless of team set-up.

Bukayo Saka has only 11 goal contributions for Arsenal - he had 16 in the first half of last season - while Manchester City's Jeremy Doku has scored just once.

when contemplating what has to change at Liverpool, Slot admits recruiting a new winger or two in the summer transfer window may not necessarily provide a solution.

Slot

"It's not only about that individual," he said. "If we don't generate enough from the sides then maybe we don't switch the ball fast enough, we don't bring them into enough open situations to improve these players.

"We have of course a 17-year-old player (Rio Ngumoha) who is improving more and more and more. It's not always the transfer market, the answer is also the training ground and trying to improve that part.

“But again, show me which teams are doing that so much better than us in the Premier League.

“I can show you one in La Liga where Lamine Yamal is playing, but I didn't see a lot of chances coming from there (out wide) from the games I watched on Wednesday.

"It's also due to the fact there are 10 big athletes who are really fast defending in and around the box.

"It's the hardest position to play in current football, being a winger, because there are so limited spaces and the players you face are so good."

Slot believes Jeremie Frimpong, who has missed significant chunks of the season through injury but made his first start at right-back in more than a month on Tuesday, represents something of a throwback.

Slot

"Maybe it has nothing to do with it but back in the day, there was right-footer on the right and a left-footer on the left,"

"Why? Because in that era you could go on the outside and cross it in.

"But everyone is so fast now. Jeremie sometimes tries, especially at the end of the game when other teams are tired he succeeds with it but at the beginning it is hard.

“Against these defenders, that's why you only see left-footers on the right and right-footers on the left, because on the outside in this physique, it's getting harder and harder and more and more difficult.

"Jeremie is maybe one of the exceptions that can go on the outside, then you have to be incredibly fast. In the old days it was much more possible as they defended further away from the man. When I played it was a completely different game."

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