'Liverpool's expensive attack is just for show'

05/10/2025 16:31:00 TrophyTracker

Former defender Gary Neville has strongly condemned Liverpool's frontline following the 1-2 loss to Chelsea. He argued that the attacking players, although bought at a high cost, were utterly ineffective against Chelsea.

This marks the third consecutive loss for Arne Slot's team, plunging the Merseyside club deeper into a performance crisis. At Chelsea's Stamford Bridge, Liverpool fell behind due to a brilliant goal by Moises Caicedo in the first half, before Cody Gakpo equalized early in the second half.

However, a late goal from the young talent Estevao helped Chelsea secure all 3 points at home. Nevertheless, what frustrated Neville the most was not the defense, but Liverpool's attacking performance.

Isak và Ekitike đề vô hại trước Chelsea - Ảnh: tribuna — Isak and Ekitike were harmless against Chelsea - Photo: tribuna

On his personal podcast, the former Manchester United star openly criticized: “Liverpool didn’t lose because of their defense. You can be certain of that if you watched the full 90 minutes. They lost because in the last 15-20 minutes, the creative players, those playing in midfield and the forwards, failed to perform their duties. They kept losing possession. With Gakpo, Salah, Wirtz... on the pitch, no one made a difference.”

Neville was especially disappointed with Mohamed Salah - Liverpool’s most anticipated star in this match: “Salah usually performs better than this. Today, every decision he made was wrong. He rushed his shots, misplaced passes, lacked decisiveness, and that’s not the Salah we normally see.”

Salah đang mất phong độ rất khó hiểu ở thời gian gần đây - Ảnh: @premierLeague — Salah has been inexplicably out of form recently - Photo: @premierLeague

Commenting further on Florian Wirtz - Liverpool’s expensive newcomer, Neville noted that the young player still lacks many qualities to shine in the Premier League. Neville emphasized Wirtz’s lack of football intelligence, poor positioning, and absence of composure at crucial moments.

According to Neville, without improving their attacking ability and midfield cohesion, Liverpool will struggle to regain the image of last season’s champions.

Meanwhile, coach Arne Slot explained the reasons behind Liverpool’s loss to Chelsea as follows: “Once again, the margin between winning and losing is very thin. Both last week and this week, the two away matches were very tough. In both games, we created more chances than the opponents. But in reality, we only scored one goal while they scored two. That is the biggest difference.”

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