ReactionPress conference: Arne Slot on Liverpool 3-1 Palace - 'We kept on fighting until the end'
Arne Slot was pleased by Liverpool's display of fight during their 3-1 victory over Crystal Palace on Saturday afternoon.
The Reds secured three points from the Premier League encounter at Anfield, having opened up a two-goal advantage in the first half through Alexander Isak and Andy Robertson.
Daniel Munoz reduced the deficit for the visitors with under 20 minutes remaining, but Florian Wirtz rasped home a clinching goal in added time.
Following the contest, Slot sat down to speak to the media in a post-match press conference. Read what the head coach had to say below...
On how he would sum up the game…
As one that we haven't had yet and that's almost impossible because all the things we've experienced this season... you could write a book about it, as I said earlier. Every time I think now, OK, now there's nothing that can happen anymore that didn't happen yet. But we saw it today - a goalkeeper on the floor and then conceding a goal. The end result is, of course, positive that we were able [to win] in a game where we conceded a goal that you prefer not to concede - you never prefer to concede a goal - but not in this way.
But we kept on fighting until the end and even scored for 3-1. So, [the] bad luck we've had many times this season, usually it ends up in us dropping points but not today. That's a very positive thing. If you just look at the performance of both teams, I think Palace deserved to come back into the game because they were playing a good game, they were close to scoring goals, the margins were really small, but another injury [to Mohamed Salah] of course after a win, that sums up again our season.
On Isak's first Premier League goal at Anfield…
Yeah, my first reaction would have been if you wouldn't have said the last part of your question. Did anyone ever think we would say this eight or nine months ago? [That at the] end of April to say that Alexander Isak scored his first [Premier League] goal for Liverpool at Anfield. That sums up this season, of course, a lot. That an unbelievable striker has had such a long time with injuries, not being available to play and now scoring his goal.
It's really nice that he scored one because when we signed him we knew he could score goals and that's what he showed today. Many times this season we've had better chances than we had today, that's why it's also important to have players that can score also goals like this, because that can give you a big lift in a game. That is what we've missed for eight or nine months because he wasn't available and when he was available, as we all know, he was available but wasn't at the level he can be.
On being 'delighted' with Freddie Woodman's performance...
That's an understatement. I think I've sat here many times telling you guys that we've created a lot of good chances and then the first one of the other team went in. Now, I cannot say that today, because they've had enough good chances and enough moments that they were really close. But I think the moment of the game was, of course, the lead-up to our 2-0 where Freddie made a big save. Otherwise it would have been 1-1. And 10 seconds later it's 2-0. These are the current margins in the Premier League and today they were on our side and so many times they have been not on our side.
On Palace's goal and his view of it with Woodman down…
Do referees only stop the game for head injuries at this time? [The] amount of times that players were pretending that they're injured, not only head injuries, and the referees buy into this. It's become a tactic in football. I've said many times over here and someone can find one or two moments that we dived and because we're not - we say this in a certain way in Holland, I don't know how you say it over here - we're not known for this. But maybe once or twice this season we've done that. In general, even today, the referee gave a penalty, which was completely correctly overturned by the VAR because there was no contact.
Why was there no contact? That's an important question to ask. Mo jumped over the tackle. I can come up with many players and many examples of many clubs where they leave their foot on the floor and then the tackle comes in and then there's contact [and] then it's a penalty. I think as a referee it becomes time that they know who they are refereeing. This same incident happened to us against Manchester United when [Alexis] Mac Allister was on the floor with a head injury, Michael Oliver the referee, keep on playing, keep on playing and we concede a goal. Five stitches.
The amount of times, even today, that the referee stopped the play.... so, yeah, you can probably feel my big frustration about it. It's already fair because people always say you always talk about [the] Paris Saint-Germain game. Yeah, there was no diving. There was no pretending. There was just fair-play football. The amount of times that games have been stopped because players pretended to be injured. That has happened so many times that I can't believe if you are refereeing Liverpool and there is a goalkeeper on the floor that you don't stop the game.
The only reason I can come up with is that the referee the moment he saved the ball [and] the ball went to a different position, he looked at that and the next moment he looks up and he sees that the goalkeeper is on the floor. That would be [the] only fair explanation why he didn't stop the game, otherwise I think he should have stopped the game.
On Oliver Glasner's view that it would be 'dangerous for football' if referees stopped the game in that situation...
I know that is going to happen because that's what I constantly see in the Premier League or everywhere around the world. Since we know that the referee can't stop the play [unless] there's a head injury, I see a lot of players that have been touched over here taking their head and then the referee always falls into their trap. But since we are not there yet, there's not been a tactic yet used by making it safe [to] stay on the floor because I see there's a difficult situation coming up because the situation wasn't difficult. The ball fell 30 [or] 40 yards out from the goal I think, so that's not a smart tactic then to go on the floor as a goalkeeper if you don't have an injury - is it? And the player that took the shot might say [that] I wasn't aware of the fact that the goalkeeper was on the floor.
But if one of my players tries to take a shot like that, if he thinks there's a goalkeeper in goal, I would ask him that's not the smartest ball to play, maybe you can better cross it in, or have a bit of a harder shot on target. So, I do agree with what he's saying. So, if from now on a goalkeeper is on the floor [and] the referee stops the game I can be 100 per cent sure that there will be teams in the future [who] are going to use that tactic. I'm sure about that. But today no-one has tried that yet. So, 10 minutes before [Yeremy] Pino was on the floor [and] we were calling for a counter-attack. Stop. There's a player on the floor. [There] was no head injury, [it] was [his] body, and he stopped the play. But another game, another referee decision. That is also part of our season, isn't it?
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