Liverpool head coach Arne Slot felt his side were unfortunate to lose against Preston North End on Friday afternoon.
The Lilywhites ran out 1-0 winners in the behind-closed-doors friendly – held at the Reds’ AXA Training Centre. Robbie Brady scored a stunning 35 yard lob, which proved enough for Ryan Lowe’s side to edge the Anfield outfit.
It was an early pre-season test for Liverpool and the fourth match of the summer for North End. Both managers switched their teams around during the game, with the hosts using 25 players over the piece. Slot was disappointed with the result, but not the performance.
“It has been a good two weeks,” he told LFCTV. “Unfortunately, the result today was not what we wanted. But they stayed fit, many of them got minutes, and I saw a lot of young players who got a few minutes.
“That is a good thing. Like I said, we controlled the game completely and we only conceded one shot. We had some good build-up and some good chances in the first half. Second half, I didn’t think we did that much – which is normal because there were a lot of young players, who didn’t play in their normal positions as well.
“We couldn’t ask for more from the boys in the first two weeks. They worked really hard and tried to implement the ideas and it is not that we only bring new ideas – a lot things here were really good. We were a bit unlucky to lose 1-0.”
Liverpool were without plenty of big name stars, due to holidays after the Copa America and Euro 2024. But, Mohamed Salah featured along with first team regulars Curtis Jones, Wataru Endo, Dominik Szoboszlai and Harvey Elliott. Ex-PNE loan star Sepp van den Berg also featured.
