How Liverpool Won the Premier League.

Liverpool have won the Premier League title after an incredibly dominant campaign from start to finish. They were strongly third favourites behind Manchester City and Arsenal at the start of the season with a new manager coming into the squad, and the manager who won them every trophy available departing. Despite this initial doubt among fans and bookmakers alike, Arne Slot and this Liverpool squad have had a sensational campaign. Let’s look at how this has happened in four summarised points.

Salah back to his best.

Mohammad Salah is back to his best, and there is no doubt about it. Not that he ever stopped being an unbelievable player for Liverpool, but this season, he has turned from one of the best players in the league to by far the best player in the league, and the best in his position in the world. At the age of 32, he is still competing (and outperforming) young stars across England and Europe who you would expect to be sharper than Salah at his age.

This next sentence is probably a good summary of Salah’s levels this season. Being miles above your league’s top goalscorers in a season is difficult, and being miles above your league’s assist experts in a season is difficult, but doing both is near impossible. But Salah leads the league for both goals and assists. It isn’t close in either category.

Arsenal and Manchester City too weak to fight.

This point is not at all to downplay Liverpool’s ability to win the league, but there is no doubt that Arsenal and Manchester City have been weak this season. That applies especially the latter of those two teams, who seemed somewhat vulnerable near the beginning of the season, but became the weakest that they have been under Guardiola when they lost Rodri to an ACL injury, as well as losing Kovacic and almost all of their central defenders at different points during the remainder of 2024. Arsenal also went through periods of losing key players like Bukayo Saka, Ben White and Martin Odegaard during the season, but even with these players available, they have shown weakness in many fixtures that title contenders must win.

Klopp leaves behind his rebuilt super-team

Interestingly, one of the main reasons for Liverpool’s success seems to be involving a Liverpool figure who is no longer at the club. After a 5th place finish in 2022/23, Liverpool went through a transitional year in 2023/24, when Jurgen Klopp replaced an ageing midfield through new signings and development of academy players. Not only that, but he developed defensive talents like Connor Bradley, who have been essential to Liverpool’s depth this season. This final rebuild seemed somewhat successful when Klopp initially left the club, but has proven better than anybody believed when his rebuilt team stormed to the league title in new manager Arne Slot’s first season. And that name brings us perfectly onto my final point.

Arne Slot.

This one doesn’t take too much explanation. Klopp’s rebuilt would mean nothing if the new manager wasn’t capable of using the players at his disposal effectively. And Arne Slot has certainly done that. Salah’s revival in world-class form has to be, at least in part, to do with Slot’s coaching. Not only that, but Virgil van Dijk, Ryan Gravenberch, Alexis Mac Allister, and so many more players seem to have really benefited from Slot’s coaching this season. Despite Klopp leaving behind an incredible team, Salah’s resurgence in form, and rivals dropping off, none of these factors would have mattered if Arne Slot had not adapted the players at his disposal to his style of play effectively, and that is exactly what he did.

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