Liverpool legend Jamie Carragher has directed his anger towards the club’s players after a humiliating Champions League defeat at home to PSV Eindhoven.
Instead of blaming Reds manager Arne Slot, Carragher feels that it’s currently the team’s players letting everyone down, while he also made the big claim that it looks like Virgil van Dijk and Mohamed Salah basically look finished at the very highest level.
Speaking on CBS Sports in the video clip below, Carragher suggested he couldn’t see Slot getting the sack, whilst insisting that he wanted to see Salah in particular come out to address the fans after the club’s awful recent form.
Jamie Carragher on Arne Slot, Virgil van Dijk, and Mohamed Salah
Words on Slot, VVD, Salah & on how much longer this can go on ?#LIVPSV #ChampionsLeague
— Jamie Carragher (@Carra23) November 27, 2025
Carragher said he’s “angry” with Liverpool’s players, and suggested we’re starting to see a glimpse of the club’s future now that key figures like Van Dijk and Salah are past their best.
“Liverpool’s not a sacking club,” the former LFC defender said. “Liverpool are different from almost every club in European football – the manager is the king, the manager gets time.
“Liverpool have never sacked a manager who’s won the league. Never in their history … I couldn’t believe at the weekend that people were talking about the manager’s job, when I spoke to Liverpool supporters after losing at home to Nottingham Forest.
“I’ve always been in the camp that you stick with the manager, I’m angry with the players if I’m being totally honest.
“But it does get to a stage with any manager at any club where I always use this word “untenable”, where it feels it can’t go on any longer. I’m not quite there yet personally, in terms of the manager, but I know a lot of supporters will be.
“I’ve had a lot of time to think about it because I knew the game was over long before the final whistle. I think what you’re seeing now is, Liverpool in 2018 under Jurgen Klopp sort of starts this journey … we’re now, what, seven or eight years later, and the catalyst for that run was Alisson, Van Dijk, and Salah.
“Alisson’s injured a lot now, he doesn’t play so much. But you watch Van Dijk now, not the same player, and Mo Salah looks like his legs have gone. I don’t like criticising them, and I think some of the criticism of them this season as players has been harsh.
“You always look for leaders in your team to step up when things are not going well. And I’ve been critical of Salah off the pitch, I want him to come out and do an interview tonight and speak to the Liverpool supporters about what the players are going to do, about what’s going on in the dressing room, giving the supporters hope that things are going to improve.
“But I don’t like criticising them on the pitch because they’re absolute legends for what they’ve done, and their legs have just gone. Van Dijk now can’t help other players, he needs help himself, and that just means he’s a normal centre-back like I was, maybe he’s not super human right now.”
Carragher questions how good some Liverpool players really are
Carragher added that he has some concerns going back to last season about how good the rest of these players are, suggesting that they’ve largely been carried by the excellent form of Van Dijk and Salah in the recent past, but that they’re now failing to step up as those two go into decline.
“I look at some of the others…step up…can you only play well when they play well?” Carragher added. “Their seasons last season were off the scale and everyone else enjoyed that, winning the league, they’re all league champions, they’ve got that on their CV, but when they’re not there, where are they, where are the others?
“That’s why I get angry about the talk of the manager, but it’s inevitable, something could happen, but in terms of the players and the way they’re performing now, that is not acceptable for Liverpool Football Club.
“I actually think and maybe I thought this a little bit last season – are some of them good enough if Liverpool want to win the biggest trophies? You saw against Newcastle in the Carabao Cup (final), you saw against PSG away from home last season, woeful performances, and they’ve been carried by some of the greatest players the club have ever had.
“This is maybe a snap shot of the future for Liverpool when Mo Salah moves on, when Virgil van Dijk moves on, and when Alisson moves on.”
How bad do you think this Liverpool crisis is now? Does Slot need to go or is it a case of offloading some of these struggling players? Let us know your thoughts in the comments!
Honestly, sincerely, truthfully, Arne Slot needs to go, it is obvious that he cannot blend the new players with the old ones and is his main challenge, the players are not showing any sign of fighting spirits at all, they look disjointed in every aspect. We need a new Coach that can bring the best out of this players. We should not wait until someone will write for board before we realize that this guy is confused and ran out of ideas.
I’m an Arsenal fan, however I feel the signs had been there since Klopp’s last season and particularly then they surprisingly won the league last season. I kept reminding a close friend and lifelong Liverpool fan that the win last season wasn’t due to Liverpool’s brilliance but a lack of a sustainable challenge from the usual suspect contenders. Having won the league though, I felt it was a massive opportunity for Liverpool to strengthen the squad by recruiting to intentionally bolster all the glaring loopholes from last season’s campaign. This wasn’t helped by the unfortunate passing of Jota (may his soul rest in peace) and the exit particularly of Trent and Diaz. Whoever recommended the summer recruitments has a major blame in this meltdown though because I feel it was a bungled opportunity to truly intentionally strengthen the club in glaring areas of weaknesses, rather than do just that similar to what my club Arsenal did, Liverpool went and threw money at a midfielder who only had Bundesliga experience ; a massive gamble givihg that recent evidence suggests that proven Bundesliga midfielers struggle in the EPL. Also having recruited Ekitike, there wasn’t any need to still go after Isak as both players are similar and it would have been wiser to recruit one only between the two freeing up funds to adequately replace Diaz, strengthen in the midfield and defence with proven EPL players (there were a couple that I feel may have helped make Liverpool a better team like Semenyo, Kudus, Guehi, Solly March and Julio Ensisco of Brighton, Cheick Doucoure of Crystal palace, and Kuadio Kone of Bournemouth just to list a few that come to mind) but Liverpool squandered a genuine opportunity to truly strengthen their team this summer by splashing huge cash largely on players who I thought were not the solution to Liverpool’s dire needs from the evidence of last season’s performance and they’ve proven not to be thus far.
Liverpool could have been the team to give my club Arsenal a run for the title and make for an exciting campaign like the Klopp vs Pep years or like Arteta vs Pep of recent years but the opportunity was sorely dashed.
I keep rooting for my club Arsenal to finally get over the line after recent years of near misses but personally it would have been a more exciting season and more satisfying win had we had a viable competitor that would’ve pushed us point for point. With the transition that Man City and Chelsea are in, I actually thought that by recruiting properly Liverpool would be that team to give Arsenal that type of toe to toe competition that makes for exciting EPL title challenge which was glaringly missing last season. Alas Liverpool wasted a golden opportunity.