{"id":549420,"date":"2026-03-19T00:16:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T00:16:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/549420\/"},"modified":"2026-03-19T00:16:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T00:16:09","slug":"arne-slot-hails-fans-backing-of-almost-perfect-liverpool","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/549420\/","title":{"rendered":"Arne Slot hails fans’ backing of ‘almost-perfect’ Liverpool"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Beth LindopMar 19, 2026, 10:42 AM<\/p>\n

Close<\/a>Based in Liverpool, Beth Lindop is ESPN’s Liverpool correspondent and also covers the WSL and UWCL.<\/p>\n

Multiple Authors<\/p>\n

LIVERPOOL, England — Arne Slot has described Liverpool<\/a> ‘s 4-0 win<\/a> over Galatasaray<\/a> as “almost the perfect game” and hailed the fans at Anfield for delivering a special atmosphere.<\/p>\n

The Reds overturned a 1-0 first leg deficit in their round-of-16 tie with a dominant performance against the Turkish Super Lig champions, with goals from Dominik Szoboszlai<\/a>, Hugo Ekitike<\/a>, Ryan Gravenberch<\/a> and Mohamed Salah<\/a> securing their passage to the quarterfinals of the UEFA Champions League<\/a>.<\/p>\n

– Champions League recap: Liverpool, Atleti and Bayern advance with ease<\/a><\/p>\n

It was a raucous atmosphere on Merseyside as Liverpool supporters rallied behind their team, despite having booed Slot and his players after Sunday’s 1-1 draw with Tottenham Hotspur<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“From start to finish, I think we played the game I was hoping for, the players were hoping for and I was hoping for,” Slot said. “Not only did we play the perfect game from start to finish but out fans did as well.<\/p>\n

Arne Slot applauds Liverpool fans following his team’s win over Galatasaray.\u00a0Molly Darlington\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

“From the start they were not accepting what we thought would happen and what happened which is that they would create a situation where the energy would run out of the stadium by making sure there was not much playing time.<\/p>\n

“Our fans reacted great to that and our players kept on going. There was a great dynamic between fans and players and almost the perfect game from us and definitely from our fans.”<\/p>\n

Slot also heaped praise on Salah, who bounced back from missing a penalty in the first half to score his 50th goal in the Champions League, becoming the first African player to achieve the feat.<\/p>\n

“It says a lot about him that after you miss a penalty just before halftime, that can sometimes be hard for an individual or for a team, so compliments for the team for how we came out in the second half,” Slot said.<\/p>\n

“Because we have had a lot of setbacks this season, a lot of first halves or second halves where we have created chance after chance after chance without doing justice to how we have performed — so not scoring.<\/p>\n

“And then Mo and the team came out in the second half the way they did, so he assisted Hugo, a great assist and then scored a trademark goal that he has scored so many times in this stadium and for this club, cutting inside, finding the corner.<\/p>\n

“So that tells you a lot about his mental strength but definitely also of the team, because adversity is something we can definitely talk about in this season.”<\/p>\n

Salah was replaced by Cody Gakpo<\/a> in the 74th minute, receiving a standing ovation from the fans at Anfield.<\/p>\n

“Injury-wise, he came off not because he had scored enough but because he felt something,” Slot said. “So let’s see where he is for the weekend and afterwards.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Beth LindopMar 19, 2026, 10:42 AM CloseBased in Liverpool, Beth Lindop is ESPN’s Liverpool correspondent and also covers…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":549421,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-549420","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549420","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=549420"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549420\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/549421"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=549420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=549420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=549420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}