{"id":58110,"date":"2025-08-11T01:13:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-11T01:13:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/58110\/"},"modified":"2025-08-11T01:13:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-11T01:13:07","slug":"arne-slot-hints-he-wants-another-striker-in-explaining-hugo-ekitike-sub-liverpool-fc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/58110\/","title":{"rendered":"Arne Slot hints he wants another striker in explaining Hugo Ekitike sub – Liverpool FC"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hugo Ekitike<\/a> could not play the full 90 minutes against Crystal Palace<\/a> as Arne Slot<\/a> felt it would be too much of a risk with no other No. 9 to replace him.<\/p>\n

Liverpool\u2019s No. 9 shirt is now vacant following the sale of Darwin Nunez<\/a> to Al-Hilal on Saturday night, but the role is now filled by Ekitike.<\/p>\n

The Frenchman started against Palace in the Community Shield on Sunday, but was only trusted to play 69 minutes before being replaced by Alexis Mac Allister<\/a> \u2013 with no out-and-out striker used in the final stages.<\/p>\n

All being well Nunez will be replaced before the transfer window closes, with Newcastle<\/a>\u2018s Alexander Isak the priority target, and explaining his decision to bring Ekitike off, Slot hinted that he wants another striker.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s always nice to score a goal \u2013 not only for him but also for Jeremie Frimpong<\/a> \u2013 if you start your career at a new club,\u201d Slot told reporters, with the \u00a379 million signing opening his account within four minutes at Wembley.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut it would have been even nicer to win a game of football, because I think that\u2019s more important than scoring a goal.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe had a good impact, but he\u2019s also an example of a player who came I think one-and-a-half, two weeks ago on our Asian tour.<\/p>\n

\"LONDON,<\/p>\n

\u201cSo for me, with only three or four days in between [now and] the Friday game [against Bournemouth<\/a>], it wouldn\u2019t be smart to play him 90 minutes.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course we have Federico [Chiesa], but of course he\u2019s not been with us for the Asian tour as well, so there\u2019s not a lot to replace him with.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo if [Ekitike] gets an injury in this moment in time, that would be a big risk for the Bournemouth<\/a>, Newcastle<\/a> and Arsenal<\/a> games.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s why I took him off, but he had a good game today, that\u2019s for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"LONDON,<\/p>\n

The call for reinforcement was more direct in Virgil van Dijk<\/a>\u2018s post-match interview in the mixed zone, with the Dutchman telling journalists: \u201cThere\u2019s always room for an attacker.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDo we?\u201d he replied, when put to him that Liverpool have plentiful attacking options.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell we just lost Darwin, we lost Lucho, so I think there\u2019s always room for an attacker in order to strengthen us.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo let\u2019s see what the window brings.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hugo Ekitike could not play the full 90 minutes against Crystal Palace as Arne Slot felt it would…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":58111,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[59,134,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-58110","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-gb","tag-liverpool-fc","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58110"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58110\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}