Gary Neville reflects on the opening weekend of the Premier League with Liverpool and Manchester United coming under his microscope; listen to the Gary Neville Podcast below
Monday 19 August 2024 15:16, UK
Arne Slot showed himself to be "clinical and brutal" with his substitution of Jarell Quansah in Liverpool's win over Ipswich, says Gary Neville.
Goals from Diogo Jota and Mohamed Salah made it an ultimately-comfortable exercise at Ipswich for Arne Slot on his Liverpool bow but the new boss played his part in the 2-0 win with a ruthless half-time substitution.
Slot spotted an issue and wasted no time in replacing Quansah at the break with Ibrahima Konate - it was not an injury-related substitution, it was purely tactical and it set the platform for Liverpool to dominate Ipswich after the break.
On the latest Gary Neville Podcast, he said: "Ipswich matched Liverpool for an hour and had a couple of moments, you have to take one if you are going to do anything against the big boys, then all of a sudden you find out about that quality.
"It just came down the right with Trent Alexander-Arnold and Mohamed Salah, and Ipswich's Leif Davis just found out about the Premier League.
"The amount of times Alexander-Arnold and Salah have played together now over hundreds of games, the amount of success they've had down the right-hand side with Trent's passing and Salah's movement.
"You saw some real quality with that last ball when he just plays it inside him. It is just something you are going to face, you're going to face teams who do not have to be at their best, but can deliver world-class moments through world-class players.
"And that is what Ipswich found and Liverpool were better in the second half. I thought Arne Slot was quite tough on Jarrell Quansah. Subbing someone at half-time is big and I do not think it is done lightly by managers. He was quite blunt about the way he answered it, there was no holding back.
"So I think there is an element of him being quite clinical and brutal, he was reacting to the game and he felt like they needed to win the duels, that was his main thought behind the decision. It worked you have to say, Liverpool were much better in the second half and it was a good win for them."
A late goal by summer signing Joshua Zirkzee earned Manchester United a nervy 1-0 win over Fulham in their Premier League season opener on Friday, but did Erik ten Hag's side show signs of moving on from last season?
Neville gave his verdict on United, with the third season of the Ten Hag era set to be a decisive one.
"On reflection, it is the same story. Winning was very important, they are still finding that right balance in the team, they have new players - they changed the centre-back partnership again in the game, which is just a little bit of a worry - Erik ten Hag said it was just precautionary with Harry Maguire and it was not an injury, but it is something they just have to monitor and to try and keep the players fit," said Neville.
"I do not think we can be sat here in October and Ten Hag is talking about excuses and injuries, as that cannot happen again this year. If you have injuries in one season that can be deemed unlucky, but if you have injuries in a second season, that is not unlucky. It is what you are, it is your medical staff, preparation, sports scientists, all those things come into question when you get repetitive injuries.
"They need to make sure they get the players out on the pitch, but there is a long way to go with them, but it was a good start for them and Joshua Zirkzee as they played without a centre forward in that game."
