Yahoo Sport 
'I visited Arne Slot's old club and everyone said the same thing about Liverpool boss'
When Arne Slot emerged as the preferred candidate to take over from Jurgen Klopp at Liverpool, there was a feeling among many — in England, at least — that this was a step into the unknown. Arriving from Feyenoord, few knew much about the 46-year-old.
Now 17 games into his tenure, Slot has already picked up 15 wins. Liverpool is top of both the Premier League and the Champions League tables and has progressed in the Carabao Cup. That one defeat against Nottingham Forest is the only black mark.
While there have been changes implemented since Slot came in, the changeover has been relatively seamless. Many outsiders assumed — or perhaps even hoped — that a similar decline to Alex Ferguson leaving Manchester United would occur. So far, though, there have been no such signs.
With Liverpool playing Bayer Leverkusen just before the international break, I spotted an opportunity. The Reds were scheduled to play at home on Tuesday, Feyenoord at home on Wednesday, and Ajax at home on Thursday — so I planned a trip to the Netherlands.
Visiting two of Holland’s biggest clubs has long been on the bucket list but I wanted to learn more about Slot’s past too. What I quickly discovered was that the so far seamless transition to life at Anfield perhaps shouldn’t have been as much of a surprise.
For starters, it is no shock that Slot speaks the language perfectly — almost everyone in Rotterdam does. Even the home crowd was singing "I’m Feyenoord til I die" in English throughout the match and the Liverpool links only get stronger from there.
Feyenoord plays You’ll Never Walk Alone along before kick-off (and the song was sung sporadically during the game too without the soundtrack). The Liverpool song We Won It In Madrid, meanwhile, is to the tune of the chorus of the 1996 song Rotterdam by The Beautiful South — played before Feyenoord matches.
By chance, Brian Priske, who took over from Slot and is now the Feyenoord head coach, was in charge of Sparta Prague last season, who Liverpool beat home (6-1) and away (5-1) in the Europa League. And Feyenoord’s opponent on this occasion was Red Bull Salzburg: the club now coached by Klopp’s old assistant, Pep Lijnders.
Former Liverpool midfielder Bobby Clark was excellent for Salzburg — a real breakout game for him after taking some time to adapt to life in Austria — while Stefan Bajcetic, on loan in Austria for the season, was missing through illness.
Alongside Oscar Gloukh, Clark, of those who featured for Salzburg, looked the likeliest to get a move to a bigger club at some point in the future and it was actually the Austrians who won the game 1-3. Feyenoord went down to 10 men when the score was 1-2, with Chris-Kevin Nadje sent off after a VAR check.
Like Liverpool, Rotterdam was a friendly city. I was helped at the tram station by a man who mentioned Slot even before I told him where I had come from. Another soccer supporter — actually a PSV fan — was keen to tell me how much he admired Slot too. "He's doing well!" they said, with an expression that suggested they might have added the words "We told you so."
Only one fan outside De Kuip had something slightly different to say when I asked about Slot. "I’m surprised he didn’t sign [Yankuba] Minteh," he said, quickly adding: "He's doing so well."
When I arrived in Amsterdam the following morning, the tour guide lavished praise on the Liverpool boss and the bus driver who took me to the airport was delighted that I’d been to Slot's old club too. Everywhere, there was a real sense of missing Slot — only overpowered by a pride at him having got the move to Anfield.
No one — not even Slot himself — would have thought that things would go this well for him at Liverpool so soon. Taking a trip to his old club and old city, however, it soon made much more sense. Everyone was delighted at how it was going for him — Feyenoord fan or not.
