Arne Slott from Liverpool. (Photo by Justin Setterfield/Getty Images)
Arne Slott praised his defenders after Liverpool's recent win over West Ham United.
The Reds defeated the Hammers 5-0 at the London Stadium on Sunday evening, thanks to goals from Luis Diaz, Cody Jacobo, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Diogo Jota and Mohamed Salah.
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The latter has received huge praise after an impressive performance that also saw him provide excellent assists.
Salah now leads the Premier League in goals (17) and assists (13) this season, three more than any other player in each category.
However, Slott did not thank Salah for this latest victory.
Instead, it is Liverpool The defense – which included an impressive performance from Jarrell Quansah, who replaced the injured Joe Gomez in the 37th minute – kept an eighth clean sheet this season, no team has kept more.
“(Clean sheets) are one of the reasons you win so often. If every time you have to score two, three or four goals, it's difficult, at the moment we are doing that, but it's not sustainable for a longer period of time,” Slott said of the defence. Liverpool, which conceded only 17 goals in 18 Premier League matches this season: “Sometimes you need to win by keeping a clean sheet and scoring a goal or two.” BBC Sport).
“In the end, we didn't need to keep a clean sheet, but that's always good for the confidence of the backline and the goalkeepers.
“If a player makes a sprint and then asks to come off, we know he has a hamstring problem and it won't take a day or two to fix it. The positive thing is that Joe (Gomez)'s replacement Jarrell Quansah played an amazing game. That shows how important he is to the team.”
Arne Slott acknowledges Liverpool's chances of crushing victory over West Ham
Of course, on another day, West Ham could have made this game more complicated, hitting the woodwork three times.
Furthermore, Liverpool's 6-3 win over Tottenham is still fresh in the memory, as they conceded two quick goals after leading 5-1.
Sunday's lockout ended a run of five games without a single match in domestic play, with Liverpool now accustomed to beating teams with their attacking power.
So, even with the strong defensive showing, Slott knows his team got a little lucky.
“Yes (a lot of goals) but there are also a lot of chances. It was 3-0 in the first half, but shortly after that, we could have scored three goals,” the Dutch coach added.
“On the other hand, it was good that they didn't have every chance, they had two or three chances, one that hit the post and one that hit the crossbar. Against Leicester, they had one chance and they scored. We were a bit unlucky because we didn't score in the first few minutes.” But we were also lucky because when the score was 1-0, Kudus hit the post.
