{"id":383862,"date":"2026-01-01T02:49:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-01T02:49:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/383862\/"},"modified":"2026-01-01T02:49:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-01T02:49:12","slug":"slot-sees-positives-as-frimpong-and-kerkez-adapt-to-end-of-a-full-back-era-liverpool","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/383862\/","title":{"rendered":"Slot sees positives as Frimpong and Kerkez adapt to end of a full-back era | Liverpool"},"content":{"rendered":"

Arne Slot has said Liverpool remain \u201ca work in progress\u201d in both full-back positions but backed Jeremie Frimpong and Milos Kerkez to make their mark as his team stabilise.<\/p>\n

Slot admits Liverpool are still adjusting to the end of the Trent Alexander-Arnold and Andy Robertson era with injuries and disruption limiting the impact of their designated successors, including Conor Bradley. Frimpong has improved since returning from his second hamstring injury of the season, however, and provided assists for Hugo Ekitik\u00e9 and Ryan Gravenberch in the recent victories over Tottenham<\/a> and Wolves<\/a>. Slot believes the summer signings Frimpong and Kerkez, from Bayer Leverkusen and Bournemouth respectively, will prove valuable assets for Liverpool, with their pace essential for the modern game.<\/p>\n

The Liverpool head coach said: \u201cWe had to make one change in that position because Trent left<\/a>. That was not ideal for me as Trent was so important to this club and was very important for me last season.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we looked in the market, Jeremie was one of the first we noticed. He has that pace similar to Conor, Milos and Robbo. That pace is one thing going forward but also if you face the forwards of Paris Saint-Germain or many Premier League teams with very, very fast wingers. It is definitely helpful to have them. Unfortunately for them they have not always had the same players in front of them. So it is still a work in progress. Especially because too many times not all of them have been available and we have had to change because of load management. But, bit by bit, we see players and the team improving.\u201d<\/p>\n

That assessment also applies to Florian Wirtz, who scored his first Liverpool<\/a> goal since his arrival for a potential \u00a3116m from Bayer Leverkusen in the win over Wolves and has impressed in recent weeks. Slot said the Germany international has needed time to adapt to the move on and off the pitch.<\/p>\n

Jeremie Frimpong has started to settle in at Liverpool, providing assists against Wolves and Tottenham. Photograph: Phil Noble\/Reuters<\/p>\n

The Dutch coach said: \u201cI can only answer from my experience being an old man, or at least much older than him. Being in a new country, because it was also my first time going abroad, it is different. Your life is a bit upside down. For a manager that is not the biggest problem because I do not have to perform on the pitch but I can understand people needing time to adapt off the pitch. The biggest adaptation coming to this league is the intensity. Even when we played once a week you can see Hugo had a cramp after 70 minutes. I did not take Florian out [against Wolves] because he was bad but because he just couldn\u2019t run any more.\u201d<\/p>\n

Liverpool are unbeaten in seven games going into Leeds\u2019 visit to Anfield on New Year\u2019s Day and, before the midweek games, had risen to fourth in the Premier League after stemming a damaging run of defeats. Slot said it was not only new signings who would improve in the second half of the season, when the entire squad should benefit from a better understanding.<\/p>\n

\u201cHistory has shown many times that the longer players play together the bigger chance you have of winning something,\u201d he added. \u201cYou saw this last season because that team was here the year before with J\u00fcrgen [Klopp]. In the first half of last season we played very good football.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you add players to what you have there is a serious chance of improving. If you replace, like we have done, then it takes time. And usually it gets better after a certain period of time. Unfortunately Giovanni Leoni we won\u2019t see him this season and Alex [Alexander Isak] will take a long time before we see him again.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Arne Slot has said Liverpool remain \u201ca work in progress\u201d in both full-back positions but backed Jeremie Frimpong…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":383863,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-383862","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383862","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=383862"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/383862\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/383863"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=383862"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=383862"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=383862"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}