Slot: 'This game had nothing to do with running, this game had only to do with playing duels'
Liverpool suffered a 2-1 defeat against Newcastle in the EFL Cup final. After the game, Arne Slot was asked whether Liverpool were physically or mentally fatigued on the day.
Slot said: "Mentally, it’s always difficult to judge. Were we on Tuesday mentally or physically tired? No. But this game had nothing to do with running, this game had only to do with playing duels and there was no intensity in terms of running in this game at all."
"So you cannot even judge it if we were tired yes or no, physically, because we could not press them. You can judge a team if they are tired and they press."
"But there was nothing to press because they played over our press. If they got a goal-kick or if they got a free-kick – which they had quite a lot of in the first half – they every time brought it into our last line, which led to a lot of set-pieces."
"So, the game was slow and not intense, so it’s difficult to judge for me if we were physically ready. Mentally, that’s always a difficult one. If you look at the result and the performance you might feel it maybe did something to us, but I prefer to look at how the game went. And this game went exactly the way they wanted it to be: a fight with a lot of duels and a lot of duels through the air."
