If you watched the Liverpool vs. Brentford game on Sunday, you experienced something quite weird: silence.
During the Jurgen Klopp era, Anfield was almost never quiet. Not only because they almost never lost, but mainly because things were always happening. Liverpool were always either pinning their opponents in the attacking third, attempting daring passes over the opposition backline, or fending off an opposition counter-attack.
Last season, Liverpool's matches averaged 94 possessions per team -- the third-highest mark in the Premier League. They took constant risks with the ball and then forced their opponents into doing the same by immediately pressuring the ball as soon as they lost it. Klopp wanted chaos, and the fans fed off the team, who fed off the fans, who fed off the team, and on and on.
But at some point in the second half against Brentford, with Liverpool leading 1-0, the fans didn't seem to know what to do. It's easy to know when to cheer when Trent Alexander-Arnold is bombing a cross-field ball to Darwin Núñez, but what noises do you make when you're watching all of the same players from a year ago patiently pass the ball around? When do you scream? How lightly should you clap?
On Sunday, Liverpool completed 92% of their passes -- their highest rate on record in a Premier League game. And they comfortably dispatched Brentford, 2-0, in a game featuring just 85 possessions per team.
So, I make that two things Arne Slot has done that Klopp couldn't: he's the only Liverpool manager to win his first two Premier League games in charge.
Over just two matches, we can't draw too many conclusions about anything, from team quality to their tactical approach. What's random, what's purposeful, what's the result of the opponent, what's caused by what players are fit -- we can't really know. But it doesn't seem like a coincidence that Liverpool broke that passing mark and confused their fanbase in only the new manager's second game in charge.