Liverpool fans – At Anfield, frustration has sunk to a decade-long low as Liverpool failed to turn home results around under Arne Slot during 2025-26. Supporters who once backed him now mix boos and jeers, with many already “Slot Out,” while the club points to title-winning co
When Arne Slot’s Liverpool finished their lap of appreciation, he didn’t step forward to take the moment. He stayed out of the way—sitting alone—while Mohamed Salah and Andy Robertson were given an emotional send-off.
For some supporters, that image felt like the mood of the season itself: something not quite landing, even when heroes were rightly celebrated.
Liverpool’s frustration has dropped to a decade-long low. with a part of the season-ticket holders’ group not feeling this level of anger since the final months of Brendan Rodgers’ tenure. Back then. the atmosphere soured during the closing stages of the 2014-15 season. and Rodgers’ spell unravelled further after a troubled start to the following campaign.
This year has offered supporters little joy to fight against. The most happiness some have felt in the calendar year came when Jurgen Klopp returned to the dugout for a Legends game. The 4-0 Champions League win over Galatasaray was also positive. but few inside the club were confident of repeating that level against PSG in the quarter-finals.
Liverpool’s home record in 2026 only deepened the sense of drift. The team failed to beat Leeds United, Burnley, Manchester City, Tottenham, Chelsea and Brentford at home in 2026. Still, they managed to squeeze over the line to qualify for the Champions League.
The problem is that it was still mathematically possible to miss out on the final day of the season, and that keeps the sting fresh. Many of the stream-watching audience have been “Slot Out” for some time. Once a hashtag takes hold, the countdown to hysteria usually follows.
That comparison to other clubs’ late-stage turns is tempting—but different. It doesn’t match Newcastle United a few years ago. when fans chanted “Steve Bruce. he’s got a big fat head” and later booed him during a lap of appreciation in May 2021. It also isn’t like Aston Villa. where supporters chorused “Steven Gerrard. get out of our club” in his final game in charge in October 2022.
What it resembles, instead, is a head coach nearing the end of his time. Up to now, Fenway Sports Group (FSG) has backed Slot and has been prepared to maintain that support into next season. The worry is how long that backing lasts if results and performances don’t improve.
In the closing games of the 2025-26 campaign, the atmosphere carried that pressure. Supporters left early. Boos were audible around the stadium. Frustration over substitutions rose, and criticism intensified. Slot stayed out of the way during the Salah and Robertson farewell. choosing to allow the focus to remain on the departing heroes.
Similar moments have played out elsewhere in football, even when the details differ. When Jesse Marsch was struggling at Leeds United. those in the stands sang Marcelo Bielsa’s name because they couldn’t detach from the love they retained for the previous coach. When Erik ten Hag lost his way at Old Trafford, the boos increased. Manchester United also booed the team off after losing to ASEAN All-Stars in Malaysia under Ruben Amorim. a week after the end of a disastrous 2024-25 campaign.
Slot’s case is described as rare and nuanced, but the season itself has left Liverpool with a plain, uncomfortable question: how do you recover when belief is fading before there’s any clear turning point?
As reported by The Athletic. senior figures at Liverpool believe Slot’s Premier League title win in his debut year—and mitigating factors this time—should justify more time. Those factors include injuries. new players taking time to settle. and the tragic death of the club’s Portugal international forward Diogo Jota in a car accident last summer.
Until now, the reaction to poor results and performances has produced a mixture of boos and jeers, not total chaos. There is still room to fix the problems. But there is also a fading belief that fixing them is possible.
There are few examples of managers turning things around from a position this difficult. Mikel Arteta is the standout at Arsenal. After winning the FA Cup in his first season. he led Arsenal to an eighth-place Premier League finish in 2020-21. despite calls for him to be sacked. A mitigating factor then was that the league campaign was heavily affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. with games played behind closed doors.
Even so, Arsenal’s hierarchy remained convinced he was the right man. In September 2023, former sporting director Edu explained to journalist Joao Castelo-Branco why. “You have to analyse your squad and ask yourself why we are not getting positive results,” he said. “It’s the coach’s or the squad’s fault?“I presented to the directors that the squad that Mikel inherited wasn’t the best possible squad for him. It wasn’t his problem, but ours. We have a responsibility to help him and empower him to do the best work possible.”.
The turnaround since—titled winners and Champions League finalists—was impressive, but it took patience. Slot, the argument goes, won’t get as long, because the writing would appear to be already on the wall.
The closest high-profile lesson for Liverpool could be Luis Enrique at Barcelona in the 2014-15 season. After five months in the job. his stint seemed to be coming to an end following previous calls for his sacking after disappointing results early into his spell. Barca lost to David Moyes’ Real Sociedad in January 2015, and it looked like there was no way back.
Enrique left Lionel Messi on the bench and Messi also sat out an open training session in front of supporters the next day in what appeared to be an act of protest. That same day, sporting director Andoni Zubizarreta was sacked. Enrique’s assistant Carles Puyol walked hours later.
Somehow, Enrique survived. He changed Barcelona’s style, making them fitter and faster, and led the club to a famous treble with Messi, Luis Suarez and Neymar.
For Slot to take belief from that, it would require a similar kind of shift. But the examples that sit in the spotlight tend to run out quickly. The start of Slot’s 2025-26 season carried an ambition: he had aspired to win back-to-back titles in his first two seasons in England. The difficulty of doing that had been highlighted before the campaign—yet it didn’t happen.
Slot’s situation is placed among managers who win the league at the first attempt and then suffer setbacks the next year. Jose Mourinho is referenced for backing up a title triumph with Chelsea in 2005 with another in 2006. while the piece contrasts that with patterns involving Carlo Ancelotti. Manuel Pellegrini and Antonio Conte.
Pellegrini was largely ushered out of Manchester City by Pep Guardiola’s availability after sabbatical. Both Ancelotti and Conte saw the wheels come off in the league second time round and ended up discarded by then Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich. The first lost his job within an hour of the final whistle of the 2010-11 campaign when Chelsea finished second. Conte’s relationship with the board fractured over the course of a fitful 2017-18 title defence. and he departed under a cloud.
Season reviews, the argument continues, will decide what happens next at Anfield—and what exactly is needed to make 2026-27 more of a success. The current state is blunt: Liverpool are described as a team getting progressively worse, and it needs to be addressed over the summer.
The numbers presented are stark. Liverpool have won only 49 per cent of their games since March 1, 2025. Across 70 games in all competitions, they have 34 victories, described as dismally inconsistent form. There is context for that run: Liverpool had as good as wrapped up last season’s Premier League by the time the run started.
And for all the troubles since, Slot is said to have shown qualities across his career as a multiple title-winning coach at AZ Alkmaar, Feyenoord and Liverpool. The one box he has not ticked yet is bouncing back from adversity.
The article leans hard on an uncomfortable truth about football: getting the opportunity to bounce back is rare. There’s no genuine reset, and “next season will be better” can mean little to supporters who will stew over the season’s inadequacies over the summer.
Even then, the piece lays out the resources Liverpool could bring into 2026-27, with new centre-backs, a strong holding midfielder, options at right-back, fit-again forwards and a young winger as Salah’s replacement. The question becomes whether Slot can find the magic formula again.
If he does, it would arguably be as impressive as winning the title in his first season.
So the real issue at Anfield isn’t simply whether Slot can deliver better football. It’s whether belief can return quickly enough—before pressure turns from a decibel level into a verdict.
Does Slot have a redemption story up his sleeve? The piece ends on the only honest answer: stranger things have happened.
Liverpool Arne Slot Anfield Premier League Champions League Mohamed Salah Andy Robertson Diogo Jota Fenway Sports Group Brendan Rodgers fan reaction