How can Slot stop the boos and get Liverpool fans back onside?

Liverpool's latest underwhelming display of the season against Chelsea last weekend was met by boos around Anfield, but head coach Arne Slot says he knows exactly what is wrong with his team and how to get them playing like champions again.

"I know what we need to get that done," said the Dutchman when quizzed post match on the home fans' unhappiness, before insisting: "I am 100 per cent convinced we will be a different team next season if we can have the summer we want - different in terms of results, different in how things look."

Slot has 'every reason to believe' he will be in charge at Liverpool next season

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Despite a clearly unhappy supporter base and fans' favourite Xabi Alonso waiting in the wings, Slot has said he believes he will be given the chance to put things right next season.

While Fenway Sports Group - the club's owners, are understood to have no plans to part company with the man who won the Premier League in his debut campaign on Merseyside.

However Slot, who only has a year left on his deal at Anfield, must now prove he does have the answers to the multitude of problems that have seen his side produce a meek title defence. The champions currently a whopping 24 points worse off than this stage last season having suffered 11 league defeats, and 18 in total, the most since 2014-15.

So, where exactly has it gone wrong this campaign and what can be done to get the Reds challenging again?

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Liverpool's regression this season can in many ways be traced back to defeat at Crystal Palace, at the end of September that brought to an end a seemingly promising five-game winning start to the defence of their title.

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Eddie Nketiah's 97th-minute winner came after the Reds failed to deal with a long throw into their box, the second time they conceded from a set play that afternoon highlighting how slow Slot and his coaching staff were to adjust to the increasingly physical nature of the Premier League this season.

Set-piece coach Aaron Briggs paid the price with his his job in December, but despite Slot then taking a more hands-on role here. Chelsea's equaliser on the weekend was the 18th time his side has conceded from a set play this campaign, the joint second-worse record in the league.

The continued inability to deal with set pieces this season has been symptomatic of the team's soft underbelly, as Roy Keane highlighted in Liverpool's recent 3-2 loss at Man Utd, when a slipshod first-half display all began when needlessly conceding early on from a corner.

"I think the worst insult for a team is when people say you're easy to play against," he said. "Liverpool are, certainly, this year. If teams think you're easy to play against, that's an insult off the back of winning the league. That will hurt the players and the manager the most.

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"If you want to stop counterattacks, stop it at source. Decision making, being in the right positions. The softness with Liverpool is even in their decision making."

There can be no reason for these shortcomings to continue next season.

The boos that accompanied the full-time whistle at Anfield on Saturday will no doubt have hurt Slot, but they were the result of yet another lacklustre performance from his side, that has left many fans bored with what they have been served up for much of this season.

Liverpool's final expected-goals total of 0.56 against a horribly out-of-form Chelsea was their lowest since edging Arsenal at home back in August, while you have to go back more than five years for the previous time they created so little at Anfield.

This is all in stark contrast, of course, to the fast-paced, heavy-metal football on display for much of previous manager's Jurgen Klopp's time in charge of the club, which by comparison does his successor no favours at all.