'That I agree on' - Liverpool boss Arne Slot fires new warning to Arsenal, Newcastle United and Man City

Arne Slot has insisted that Liverpool will be looking to freshen up their squad to defend the Premier League title next season - and believes tying down Virgil van Dijk and Mo Salah underlines the club’s ambitions.

The Reds are on the verge of claiming the top-flight crown in Slot’s first season as head coach. They could yield the silverware this weekend with a victory at Leicester City should second-placed Arsenal lose at Ipswich Town.

Slot’s achievement has been more impressive given that he signed just one fringe player in Federico Chiesa after succeeding Jurgen Klopp as manager.

Liverpool are expected to make several additions in the summer, with the likes of Arsenal, Manchester City and Newcastle United set to get stronger for 2025-26. Slot believes that it has already been a ‘big summer’ keeping Salah and van Dijk. And while he suggested there might not be wholesale changes to the current dressing room, fresh faces will arrive.

Slot said at his pre-Leicester press conference: “It tells you that we want to keep our best players. They are players who have played a great season for so many years in a row. When we are able to keep them as free agents, it tells the ambitions we have for the upcoming years. I’m really happy both extended. Virgil is so important, defensively and offensively, in and around the dressing room. A great personality and a great football player.

“I think at Liverpool there is always a big summer and it is already a big summer now. Maybe the players don't follow everything that has been said in the media, me neither, but what I do know it was it was a big thing – 'Can we hold onto them?' - and by already holding on to two, it is already a big summer. Let's see what the rest of the summer will bring but it would be strange for me to say now I am not happy with the team we are having because I've said this for a year, we are happy with the team we are having. Maybe if we can keep that team it will already be a big summer.

“We have showed the opposite last season, because we didn't change anything and I don't think we went downwards. In general, I agree, but there is also lots of studies being done that the longer a team plays together, the more success it has. I think the core of the team you want to keep as long as you can together, as long as they are performing in the best possible way, but it is also in general, good to have some new energy in and around the place with one or two players, that I agree on.

“But it isn't really a necessity when you look at the quality we have and the quality of the season we have had because, again, we saw during the week how good a team Newcastle is. They are number three and that they played so well against us in the League Cup final is probably not a surprise any more. Paris St Germain have been good but [Aston] Villa, number seven at the moment, showed they can win against Paris St Germain. What a league we are in.”