Part 3: What Needs to Happen for Liverpool to be Better in 2026-27?
With the club appearing fully committed to continuing with embattled head coach Arne Slot following a crushingly disappointing season, the question now turns to what it will take to fix what’s broken with this Liverpool side—or if that’s even possible without changing more than just a couple of players.
There’s been plenty of talk about a need to sign a pair of pacy wingers, moves meant both to replace departed legend Mohamed Salah as well as to correct last summer’s decision by sporting director
Richard Hughes to sell Luis Diaz without properly replacing him, but Liverpool’s problems this season went well beyond the wide-men with major issues also found in midfield and defence and growing questions about the presumed succession plan to goalkeeper Alisson Becker.
There will also be many who think no number of signings will fix what’s actually wrong with this side and that, inevitably at this point, the club will be looking for a new manager around about October. We wanted to know, then, how the contributors here at TLO would fix things. Assuming they think things can be fixed within the club’s current framework.
Zach
Liverpool must improve in a number of areas, including passing, creating chances, and defending.
Dex
There are needs in defence and attack, but for me the priority has to be on midfield and replacing Alexis Mac Allister. I don’t like to single out players, and I’m not doing this to denigrate his past accomplishments at this club, but watching him play this season has been one of the most miserable experiences in my 30+ years of following this club.
All those heavy minutes and that mysterious hernia he had at the end of last season seem to have finally caught up to him. Our best deep passer in midfield, routinely being unable to complete passes, control simple touches under pressure, and sometimes going entire games without winning a simple duel has been catastrophic for both defence and attack. I would have very much liked for Slot pull Alexis from the firing line and given more chances to Curtis Jones or even Trey Nyonyi.
I think Mac Allister’s regression also affected what Ryan Gravenberch has had to do this season, and he could really use some simplification of his role and duties to hopefully get him back to the sparkling form we saw the season before.
Thankfully, we’ve already been linked with Crystal Palace’s Adam Wharton, plus more tentatively with players like Lamine Camara of Monaco and Mamadou Sangaré of Lens as other potential midfield additions. These sorts of signings would really help with our incredibly slow buildup play and the number of duels or second balls we win in midfield, which has been a real issue all season.
Jordan
My only real hope for the club at this point is that everyone involved speaks with a really skilled grief therapist or good sports psychologist in the short break periods we have this summer. A World Cup year doesn’t afford a lot of that time when half of our squad will be fractured across North America for the tournament, but I’m glad they’ll have that break away from the dismal vibes around the club right now. I’m not sure time away is a long-term solution for actually fixing those vibes, though.
I know there are a lot of positional holes in the squad that need to be filled, and I know (or rather hope) the higher ups will be working on that immediately as it became clear this season that they didn’t properly address that last summer. But honestly, the only thing I really want for next season is for everyone to be able to rest as much as their lives will allow and to be able to come back for preseason and get through it with a little more energy and dedication than last year.
As childish or naive as it might sound, I just hope everyone feels better when they return for whatever preseason regimen faces them. I hope they take care of themselves, and each other.
Mari
What worries me most is the team looked so fundamentally unfit this season, and in a World Cup year pre-season always becomes more of a challenge. The most immediate controllable that feels like it needs fixing is fitness and coaching, as Liverpool defensively looked so lacking in basics this season and seemed to be unable to consistently link up cohesively in the build-up.
Despite the added difficulty of international duty for a major tournament (and my word do many of these boys look like they simply need a little time off not thinking about football!), cohesiveness and fitness really do need to be addressed. Bring back the “fully in control” calm and collected Liverpool of 2024-25 please, just with some new, exciting faces!
Naturally, of course, there need to be new signings both to fill the extremely huge gaps left by departing players and apparent gaps the side played with all season. And, related to this, I never again want to have to debate which midfielder will be playing right back. Thanks.
Noel
What Zach said back at the start is funny, for certain values of. But also kinda true. Liverpool feel a little in the wilderness right now. Last summer, we were told this was a side already well set up for long-term success. That the core of any rebuild had largely already been done. Obviously there were questions about how the club could ever replace Salah, longer term, but midfield had been rebuilt and a future number one goalkeeper secured and there was solid talent and depth across the pitch and oh yeah the side had just won the Premier League.
They leveraged that to go big in the transfer window last summer and the universal expectation amongst both Liverpool fans and pundits was that they were favourites to retain that title. All the players who looked like they would be the core for long-term success? Now they don’t (hey there, Alexis Mac Allister). All the players upper management decided were expendable last summer? Turns out they were more important than Richard Hughes or Arne Slot apparently thought (hey there, Luis Diaz). The goalkeeper signed to replace Alisson Becker, probably this summer? He’s a liability on the ball which was obvious when the club first signed him but so it goes, I guess (sorry, Giorgi Mamardashvili).
I have no doubt that this is still a massively talented squad. Losing most of any remaining Klopp-era players who were marinated in the club’s culture—or perhaps now former culture—makes it harder. An unbalanced squad left by Richard Hughes’ transfer missteps last summer (and the summer before, see: Mamardashvili) makes it harder. Plenty of things do make it harder. But this is still, fundamentally, a very good squad.
My problem is that this is Hughes’ third summer as sporting director and nothing from the first two makes me confident he’s the man to manage recruitment. While the idea of Liverpool being a job learning experience for him rankles, the only real hope is that at the third summer of asking he’s now figured things out—just in time to pop the parachute and head to the Saudi Pro League if rumours are to be believed.
My problem is that while head coach Arne Slot was dealt a tough hand dealing with the tragic passing of Diogo Jota last summer, his Liverpool have been in decline going back 18 months now. Pressing efficiency, patterns of play, defensive structure, fitness. Slot had a wonderful first six months but basically everything since has gotten steadily and consistently worse and we just wrapped up the 2025-26 season still wondering when this group was going to start showing signs of developing any kind of a tactical identity.
I have no doubt that this Liverpool side isn’t beyond salvaging. There’s too much good still in it. I have no good reason to think—beyond blind faith and deluded hope, at least—that the people in charge of salvaging it are up to the job. But perhaps I’ll have talked myself around by August. Because, you know, blind faith and deluded hope.
