Andoni Iraola: What’s on new Liverpool head coach’s to-do checklist at Anfield following Reds’ disappointing season?

Andoni Iraola has been appointed Liverpool head coach after Arne Slot’s sudden departure from Anfield and he has an entire host of points to search out solutions to earlier than the beginning of the following marketing campaign.

Iraola inherits a group that produced a limp title defence, ending the season 24 factors worse off than once they gained the Premier League in Slot’s debut season in cost 12 months earlier. They had been nearer to the relegation zone than eventual champions Arsenal.

That their aim distinction was down 35 additionally says loads in regards to the comparative struggles at each ends of the pitch between Slot’s two campaigns on the membership, whereas the 20 defeats suffered in all competitions in 2025/26 – probably the most since a dismal season beneath Graeme Souness in 1992/93 – paints a damning image too of a bunch of gamers missing in confidence and perception.

Iraola due to this fact has loads to get caught into between now and the beginning of the brand new league season on August 22 – simply 33 days after this summer time’s World Cup ultimate, giving the brand new Liverpool boss scant time with which to work together with his gamers and implement his concepts.

Chief among the many issues going through Iraola if he needs to make the followers believers, not doubters, once more are the next….

Repair dodgy defence

Extremely, Slot’s title winners let in a whopping 53 objectives final season, their most ever in a 38-game Premier League season.

That complete included 20 set-piece objectives (excluding penalties), the second most in Europe’s top-five leagues and the joint-highest within the Premier League alongside, maybe worryingly, Bournemouth, who Iraola coached from 2023-26.

And when Iraola does lastly get to work together with his defensive unit on the AXA Coaching Centre after the World Cup, he will likely be doing so with out Ibrahima Konate as a part of his again line following the France central defender’s departure from the membership on a free switch.

Jeremy Jacquet, presently sidelined with a shoulder drawback, is in line to exchange his compatriot as captain Virgil van Dijk’s centre-back accomplice, whereas Giovanni Leoni may also be competing for that function as soon as he recovers from a long-term ACL damage sustained on his debut final September.

Assimilating these two younger defenders right into a new-look Liverpool defence, whereas making them much less weak on the again, will likely be one in all Iraola’s most urgent challenges, though he confirmed when dropping his whole again 4 and goalkeeper at Bournemouth final summer time that he can deal with such integration.

Kind out Alisson, Jones and Gomez’s futures

Iraola will likely be desperately hoping Alisson Becker is a part of his defence subsequent season after studies in Italy claimed the skilled goalkeeper was needed by Juventus this summer time.

Nevertheless, the membership did set off a contract extension in March to maintain the Brazil worldwide at Anfield till 2027 and are understood to have instructed the 33-year-old they count on him to honour that dedication.

Whether or not that can also be the case with Curtis Jones and Joe Gomez, nevertheless, stays to be seen, with the duo’s futures at Anfield unsure.

Jones is needed by Inter Milan, who tried to signal him in January, and with each gamers’ contracts operating out in 12 months’ time, the brand new boss will urgently wish to sit down with the Englishmen to gauge their ideas.

Make Anfield rocking once more with return to Klopp’s chaos

When Liverpool had been booed off by sections of Anfield following insipid attracts with struggling Tottenham Hotspur and Chelsea in direction of the tip of final season, regardless of his many protestations on the contrary, the writing appeared very a lot on the wall for Slot.

The house trustworthy had grow to be uninterested in what they had been being served as much as watch, whereas many had additionally uninterested in the Dutchman’s various excuses for his aspect’s struggles, whether or not that be the opposition’s low blocks, or the long-ball techniques more and more used to attempt to nullify the then champions.

That Slot was seemingly unable to discover a resolution to these curve balls thrown his method in the course of the marketing campaign finally counted most towards him when sporting director Richard Hughes performed his end-of-season overview and determined his destiny.

Hughes introduced Iraola to Bournemouth from Rayo Vallecano in the summertime of 2023 following one other eyebrow-raising managerial departure in Gary O’Neil – who had simply saved the south-coast membership within the prime flight – and will likely be hoping this resolution proves simply as prescient.

And it was revealing that in Liverpool’s assertion explaining Slot’s exit, the membership stated: “We have come to the conclusion that the team now needs to evolve again. With the recruitment already made, and more planned, the feeling is that the next phase requires a more front-foot, aggressive and urgent style of football.”

That Iraola is understood to favour “chaos over organisation”, in accordance with an interview in The Sunday Occasions, with former Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp somewhat than Pep Guardiola his teaching inspiration, may have been a giant think about why Hughes selected him to exchange Slot.

Now all of the 43-year-old should do is get his new fees taking part in the kind of “heavy-metal football” Mohamed Salah referenced in his ultimate parting shot at Slot.

Get £320m attackers gelling whereas revitalising fading stars

A method to assist them return to the type of ‘front-footed’ soccer that was lacking final season can be for Iraola to get Alexander Isak, Florian Wirtz and Hugo Ekitike to lastly gel collectively.

That trio value the small a part of £320.5m as a part of the membership’s record-breaking switch spend final summer time, however because of damage, they had been on the pitch collectively for simply 119 minutes.

There will likely be large sympathy for Slot on this regard and his successor should hope for extra luck with regards to having his gamers obtainable subsequent season, particularly these big-money attackers.

As a result of if he does, then Liverpool’s house owners will certainly count on extra of a return than the 19 league objectives the trio produced between them of their debut campaigns at Anfield, 11 of which got here from Ekitike earlier than his season-ending Achilles damage in March.

Particularly, Iraola should discover a technique to extract the most effective out of the Premier League’s costliest participant, though he is not going to have lengthy on the coaching floor in pre-season to work with Isak and co.

Teaching is what the Basque loves most and Hughes will now hope his abilities right here additionally translate to bringing the most effective from final summer time’s different new signings Milos Kerkez, who excelled beneath him at Bournemouth in 2024-25 when making the PFA Workforce of the Yr, and Jeremie Frimpong.

In addition to these new fees, Iraola additionally must revitalise Cody Gakpo and Alexis Mac Allister and, to a lesser extent, Ryan Gravenberch, who struggled to achieve the heights of the earlier 12 months’s title-winning marketing campaign.

And at last, nurturing the nascent profession of thrilling ahead Rio Ngumoha and transitioning the 17-year-old from an influence sub to an everyday starter on the left-hand aspect of the assault will likely be excessive on the brand new Liverpool boss’ agenda.

Discover Salah alternative as a part of summer time switch technique

Iraola will not be somebody who likes to get entangled in recruitment, preferring as a substitute to focus on teaching whereas the sporting director finds the appropriate gamers to suit the system, which fortunately is how the Fenway Sports activities Group [FSG] operates.

So, whereas the brand new man is not going to be anticipated to search out Salah’s alternative himself – and in any case Hughes and Michael Edwards, CEO of Soccer at FSG, have already recognized RB Leipzig’s Yan Diomande for that unenviable function – he will certainly have some type of enter into the membership’s summer time switch technique.

As said on Slot’s exit, “more recruitment is planned this summer”, with Jamie Carragher telling Sky Sports activities his former membership wanted at the least three new signings for subsequent season: “They don’t need to bring six or seven players in, because it’s more change, but there’s three players that need to go right into the team for me.

“Substitute Mo Salah with a proper winger, a right-back and a central midfielder, then the gamers you got final summer time like Ekitike, Isak, Wirtz grow to be higher gamers.”

Anticipate Iraola and Liverpool’s once-famed recruitment group then to pour over the info collectively this summer time to assist produce a way more balanced squad for him work with than they left Slot with final season.