Diogo Jota: Former Liverpool goalkeeper Caoimhin Kelleher says performances and results at his old club are not quite as important at Anfield season after Portugal winger’s death last summer
by Red_Brummy
Diogo Jota: Former Liverpool goalkeeper Caoimhin Kelleher says performances and results at his old club are not quite as important at Anfield season after Portugal winger’s death last summer
by Red_Brummy
8 Comments
He’s right, the passing of Diogo made this season a bit of a wash from the start, and that’s ok. Between his loss and its effect on the existing squad, and the multiple departures and incoming signings trying to gel around all that, this is essentially the transition season that Slot didn’t experience last season.
Hoping the vets are able to come back stronger and more settled mentally next season, and that the new arrivals will be fully bedded in as well, so that we can hit the ground running.
I get that, the atmosphere at the club and in the dressing room must have been dire, understandably.
Can’t help thinking that Allison being out of the side was probably was a miss also.
They’ll still be using this in twenty years won’t they?
That makes complete sense. No way it hasn’t had an impact.
Suggesting otherwise would be totally unfair, this sort of thing changes people. I haven’t once seen any Liverpool players or fans using it as excuse, and rightly so because that would be wrong and in bad taste.
But it’s correct to acknowledge lots of those players lost a friend and that is no small thing. Some things are just bigger than football.
That’s some way to write a headline…
I have no doubt that this is true, and I have no doubt that we will never fully understand the mid-to-long term impacts his death has had on the team as individual human beings.
However, I’m a little uncomfortable using his death as a catch-all excuse to handwave every misstep this club has taken.
Our performances and the emergence of Slot’s lethargic style of football were taking root as early as February 2025; our decision to not buy a CB for the here and now across two windows; our decision to clearly piss the League Cup away to justify fitness for bigger games, only to perform poorly in all but one of them; the poor man-to-man management of Arne Slot; the astronomical increase in injuries; the vapid interviews…how can anyone in good conscience look at all that and say ‘Ah yeah but Jota died so it makes sense’ — no it doesn’t!
I suppose all the grief and decision-making and managerial prowess will magically fix itself come the end of the season? Jota deserves better than his name being a trump card to shoot down very real concerns about the direction we’re going.
OF FUCKING COURSE IT HAD AN IMPACT
but to be the devils advocate Liverpool went unbeaten until 27/09/2025. Up until that moment everyone were calling them amazing and they persevered so much etc etc and everyone had them sweeping the league.
My humble opinion is that jotas death had some impact on some players but the main reason is that Klopps team won the League and due to many transfers (and the death) Klops team was demolished and also some players didnt have a good season (salah carried last year)
If they had won the League everyone would be saying they used his death as motivation. It’s never as simple as that.
Some of the players will be affected a lot and it’ll have an impact on their performance. Some won’t be affected at all and it won’t. Some will be affected a lot but it won’t affect their performance.
There are people I see every day in work or people on my team who I’m very close with. And then there’s others I’m not close with.