Gary Neville urges Arne Slot to DITCH Liverpool formation and start overlooked star

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Gary Neville has advised Arne Slot to abandon his preferred 4-2-3-1 formation if he hopes to turn around Liverpool's flailing fortunes. The Reds slipped to 11th in the Premier League table after a crushing 3-0 defeat at home to struggling Nottingham Forest on Saturday.

The reigning champions have now lost six of their last seven matches in the English top-flight, and tasted defeat in eight of their last 11 games across all competitions.

Such a slump comes despite winning the Premier League title with ease last season and then embarking on a £450m spending spree, breaking the British transfer record twice in the process to sign Florian Wirtz and Alexander Isak.

However, despite bringing in eight new senior players, most of Liverpool 's fresh faces have struggled to hit their stride since arriving at Anfield.

At the same time, several Reds players have failed to replicate the performances that helped them secure the Premier League title last season, with Ibrahima Konate and Mohamed Salah coming under particular scrutiny, reports the Liverpool Echo .

And with Liverpool's defeat to Forest highlighting their defensive weaknesses, having conceded 30 goals from their 19 games this season, Neville insists that Slot should switch to a 4-4-2 formation and introduce Joe Gomez at right-back in an attempt to rescue the Reds' season.

"The manager has to change the style or the system and help them," he said on The Gary Neville Podcast. "It means being more solid in midfield and the back, and personnel changes.

"[Milos] Kerkez is struggling, [Ibrahima] Konate is struggling so do you have to put four centre-backs in your back four and keep a narrow, tight back four and tell everyone you mean business to keep clean sheets and stop teams having chances on your goal.

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"Then in midfield, you put a narrow four in there. That could be [Dominik] Szoboszlai, [Alexis] Mac Allister, [Ryan] Gravenberch and [Florian] Wirtz or [Cody] Gakpo tucked in a bit more narrow and you might leave [Mo] Salah off [Hugo] Ekitike or [Alexander] Isak or play Ekitike and Isak.

"Leave them up there, work as a two and do something a bit different. It feels a bit basic and I'm telling Arne Slot what to do but I've seen world-class managers drop their ego on how we are going to play, forget we're a great side and a great club - you're not as this moment, you're easily beatable so have to do something different and pay teams respect and change.

"I called on it a few weeks ago, I said maybe Joe Gomez should play right-back, Andy Robertson at left-back and play as a narrow back four. Be a bit more pragmatic.

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"Something has to change in the collective in terms of how they are going to play. From an individual perspective you have to strip it right back to the foundations, whether that's sleep, stretching, eating, the tiny details. Do everything better.

"Slot is a brilliant manager with real class, but he's got to reverse and do something different - maybe make some difficult decisions.

"He's going to come under pressure, let's not get too carried away with that. The players have to step up, or it will become a problem."

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