{"id":171936,"date":"2025-09-21T14:13:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-21T14:13:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/171936\/"},"modified":"2025-09-21T14:13:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-21T14:13:08","slug":"alexander-isak-and-hugo-ekitike-definitely-necessary-arne-slot-explains-liverpool-fc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/171936\/","title":{"rendered":"Alexander Isak and Hugo Ekitike “definitely necessary” – Arne Slot explains – Liverpool FC"},"content":{"rendered":"

Arne Slot<\/a> has stressed the importance of Liverpool having two top-quality No. 9 options in their squad, saying it is a necessity.<\/p>\n

The Reds edged past Everton<\/a> with a 2-1 win at Anfield on Saturday, with Hugo Ekitike<\/a> scoring the second goal of the afternoon.<\/p>\n

He was preferred to Alexander Isak<\/a> in attack, as Liverpool\u2019s record signing finds his feet, with the Premier League<\/a> champions having two wonderful options to call upon.<\/p>\n

Speaking<\/a> in his post-match press conference, Slot made it clear that having both Isak and Ekitike is far from a luxury, but instead something that is \u201cdefinitely necessary\u201d for him.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cLike any other team in this league, every team has two No.9s \u2013 you could see this with Everton<\/a> today as well,\u201d Slot said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have two No. 9s of excellent quality, like our competitors have as well. <\/p>\n

\u201cNow it\u2019s really a good thing because Hugo is definitely not ready, coming from a different league, to play three times 90 minutes in this pace, in the way we play. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a high-intensity game, we constantly try to press. When the ball is out of play, our goalkeeper tries to start the play fast instead of taking a minute.<\/p>\n

\"LIVERPOOL,<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a high-pace game we try to play and Alex \u2013 as we all know now because I said it so many times and I think it was out in the open before as well \u2013 has only trained two weeks with the team, which he didn\u2019t do for four months. <\/p>\n

\u201cSo to have two now is definitely necessary and every top Premier League<\/a> team has two great No. 9s \u2013 and we do as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

A narrative has been built in the media and among rival supporters that Liverpool didn\u2019t need to sign Isak on top of Ekitike this summer.<\/p>\n

It is an opinion that makes little sense, however, considering Luis Diaz<\/a> and Darwin Nunez<\/a> were sold, and Diogo Jota<\/a> tragically passed away in July.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Without Isak, Liverpool would look alarmingly short in central attacking areas, so two new strikers were always going to be needed.<\/p>\n

It is great to see the Reds have some elite options in the final third, with a lack of depth there so often holding them back in the past.<\/p>\n

They were capable of running Man United<\/a> close in the late 2000s, for example, but once Fernando Torres was injured, there simply wasn\u2019t enough quality in reserve.<\/p>\n

This is arguably the strongest squad Liverpool have ever had, even if they do feel one centre-back short, and they are primed to thrive across four competitions this season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Arne Slot has stressed the importance of Liverpool having two top-quality No. 9 options in their squad, saying…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":171937,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[69],"tags":[18765,16093,16415,403,99],"class_list":["post-171936","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-alexander-isak","tag-arne-slot","tag-hugo-ekitike","tag-soccer","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171936","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=171936"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171936\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/171937"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=171936"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=171936"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=171936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}