Liverpool had just secured a 3-0 win away at Marseille in the UEFA Champions League last Wednesday when the text message landed on Jamie Carragher’s phone.
The former Liverpool defender was in the middle of post-match analysis on CBS Sports in the United States but his mother, Paula, stole the show. “Oh my God,” she wrote. “What a win! Been at the theatre, just seen the score, made up!”
Encouraged by his co-analyst Micah Richards (known as Big Meeks at CBS towers), Carragher phoned his mum live on air and, after some small talk, explained that she was live on American television.
“You’re jokin’!” she laughed, before being charmed by her boy’s fellow panellist Thierry Henry.
“Hello, mommy. How are you?”
“Hello Thiary…”
For the CBS trio, chaired as ever by Kate Scott, it was yet another one of those spontaneous moments ready-made for the modern age of viral sports programming. The CBS social posts on X and Instagram recorded over 4 million views, once again making its shoulder programming the global epicentre of Champions League broadcasts.
This might be one of the most wholesome moments in the history of live TV 😂❤️ pic.twitter.com/5fSB8Kxb3n
— CBS Sports Golazo ⚽️ (@CBSSportsGolazo) January 21, 2026
The crew will once again come together on Wednesday for the final round of games in the Champions League’s group phase, which CBS are calling Matchday Mayhem.
Paramount+ will broadcast all 18 simultaneous matches, as well as whiparound coverage showing every goal as it goes in.
There is a large chunk of jeopardy, with every club from Galatasaray in 17th down to Ajax in 32nd place at risk of elimination, while a slew of sides including Manchester City and Barcelona are vying to finish in the top eight of the 36-team table, which would see them bypass the playoff round next month and advance direct to the last 16 in March.
It could be a dizzying evening, but Carragher has broken off from preparation to speak to The Athletic via Zoom. And he is not short of opinions, especially when it comes to Liverpool.
He outlines where it has gone wrong for the Premier League champions this season and where the responsibility lies. He warns that several big decisions taken by the club last summer in the transfer market have so far “blown up” in Liverpool’s face, querying how they ever planned to get attacking trio Hugo Ekitike, Florian Wirtz and Alexander Isak — signed for a total cost of £320million ($441m) — in the same team, while also identifying the causes of Liverpool’s sluggish Premier League showings.
The primacy of the Premier League in the Champions League was also on the agenda. The six English teams are in the top 11 of the league phase after seven of the eight rounds, with only Manchester City outside the top eight. Tottenham Hotspur, Newcastle United and Liverpool, all underperformers in the Premier League, have enjoyed a smooth ride in European competition this season.
So, is the Premier League, with all its riches, getting better, or is its competition across the continent dropping off?
Carragher suggests only Bayern Munich of Germany are “where they normally are — one of the big favorites, almost the best team right now, alongside Arsenal.”
He adds: “When we see Premier League teams doing so well in the Champions League, I think there’s a physicality that European teams can’t cope with. We know how important set pieces are right now in the Premier League. But I can’t say I’m getting fooled by certain clubs, namely Tottenham, Liverpool and Newcastle, doing well in Europe, because I am watching them every week and I don’t feel like I’m seeing top teams.
“There’s no doubt the bottom half of the Premier League is really strong, powerful and aggressive. The Premier League has become the Super League. That whole idea was born from everybody realising how, besides four or five other big clubs around Europe, the Premier League was the place to be. It’s difficult to shout that from the rooftops on the pitch, as we don’t win enough European Cups (Premier League sides have won three of the past seven Champions League titles).
“But I watched Arsenal in Inter Milan (in the previous round). They did not have Declan Rice, Gabriel or Martin Odegaard and they beat the team who are top of Serie A. It was comfortable. I’m not sure if I’m comfortable with it almost being as easy as it seems right now for English clubs. I do want to see Real Madrid, Barcelona and Juventus bounce back, these great European teams.”
Within the cohort of English teams, Carragher sees Arsenal and Liverpool as the most dangerous in the knockout stages, which begin next month. In Arsenal’s case, he cites the depth of their squad — “I look and just think, ‘Wow’” — as well as their defensive strength being an asset over a two-legged tie.
And as for Liverpool, who have struggled badly in the Premier League?
“They just have something with the European Cup (having won the competition now known as the Champions League six times), and it looks like the team is far more suited to European football than English football, where this season’s been about set pieces, long throws, counter-attacks and deep blocks. Those situations don’t come up as much in Champions League games. The opposition want to come out and have a game of football. That’s one of the reasons why Liverpool won at Marseille and Inter and beat Real Madrid at home.”
Earlier this week, on Carragher’s other big television commitment, UK broadcaster Sky Sports’ Monday Night Football, Carragher warned that head coach Arne Slot’s position would be in jeopardy if his team miss out on qualification for next season’s Champions League, particularly given their summer spending (which ultimately totalled almost £450million — $621m).
Liverpool lie sixth in the Premier League, one place outside the likely cut-off point for English teams’ Champions League qualification, and are winless in five league games.
“It’s difficult if you go from champions to not making the Champions League,” Carragher says. “You’ve got to believe that your manager is taking you somewhere. What you never want to do — and Manchester United have made this mistake a couple of times — is when you’re thinking, ‘I think we should change it, but I’m not 100 per cent’, and then get to October and you think, ‘We should have done it’.
Arne Slot celebrates Liverpool’s Premier League title win (Carl Recine/Getty Images)
“I hate even talking about it, because I adore the manager. He won us the league, the football was amazing, but there is a lot of criticism out there from Liverpool supporters. If he gets into the Champions League and we see signs of progression, has a good run in the FA Cup or Champions League, I’d say, ‘No, this is a collective thing. The players aren’t playing how they were, the manager hasn’t had his best season, the people above him have got to take a lot of responsibility’. But if you finish sixth, that’s a major drop-off. It would be difficult to make an argument for (that).”
Many Liverpool fans are frustrated by the lack of intensity in their side’s Premier League performances, both in their pressing and in how fast they move the ball. What is causing this?
“It can be the nature of the players you have,” Carragher says. “If you lose Luis Diaz (sold to Bayern last summer) and bring in Florian Wirtz, they are completely different players. Diaz is a runner, he doesn’t have the ability of Wirtz. But you are moving the team (in another direction). No one could argue that Darwin Nunez (another departure after the title season) is a better footballer than Hugo Ekitike, but he just ran around like a madman at times. So there would be energy and power.
“You can also look at how the manager trains. Are the players fit enough to play that type of football? Under Jurgen Klopp, the team got a lot of injuries. Slot doesn’t get as many in terms of people pulling hamstrings or missing two to three weeks at a time. That was championed last season. People said, ‘This is better than Klopp’. But when you want your team to be as intense as a Klopp team, you’re going to get casualties.
“There is a tactical (element), too. The game has become almost man-to-man, crazy pressing. But when I watch us press, we always press and have a spare man at the back. Sometimes that’s right, but it can’t be right all the time. Because teams are so good technically, you’re not just one man down if you have a player at the back spare, you are two men down because the opposition goalkeeper can be good enough with the ball at his feet. So it’s very difficult to win the ball back off somebody in the final third. Teams are getting out against Liverpool far too easily.
“If you have a problem breaking teams down with the ball then, as Klopp famously said, counter-pressing is better than any No 10. We should be going after teams a lot more without the ball. Now, whether we’ve got the players to do that, whether they’re fit enough to do that, whether the manager feels the players will be getting injuries because the squad is not big enough, I don’t know. I just think intensity off the ball has always got to be part of what Liverpool are about, because that’s how you get the crowd whipped up.
“Every club has a style of football. Every manager has his own idea. But I think every supporter who goes into grounds, when they describe what they like watching, it’s fast football. I don’t think anyone likes slow football, even if it’s winning. It is that thing that gets you on the edge of the seat, that game you remember, that game that makes you go bouncing out the stadium.
“Liverpool had that better than anybody with Klopp. His football wasn’t the most successful in the world — that was Pep Guardiola’s — but it was the most exciting.
“There’s no doubt Arne Slot’s hero in management is Pep Guardiola. He raves about him. The lovely balance between Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola football was what we saw last season in Liverpool winning the title. Now it looks like it’s gone too far the other way.”
Warming to his theme, Carragher draws a parallel in a different part of Liverpool.
“In some ways, it reminds me a little bit of Roberto Martinez going to Everton,” he says. “In his first season, he sprinkled a little bit of Roberto Martinez stardust onto a David Moyes team, which was very solid and powerful. Then the next season we saw a little bit more, and they came away from that lovely mix. They just fell away from where they wanted to be. And it looks like that’s also happening at Liverpool.”
As for last summer’s recruitment effort, led by Michael Edwards, the CEO of football for Liverpool’s U.S. owners Fenway Sports Group, and the club’s sporting director Richard Hughes, Carragher says flaws have become evident.
“No recruitment team has ever been given their flowers more than Liverpool’s, and rightly so,” he says. “They’ve been really clever in the market and ahead of the game. But you have to look at it and say every big decision this summer — we are talking with hindsight, of course — has blown up in their face.”
He cites the hefty contract extensions for thirty-something stalwarts Mohamed Salah and Virgil van Dijk, as well as the spree on Wirtz, Ekitike and Isak. “It was very difficult for them not to give those contracts. But that hasn’t worked out quite so well. As for the big-money signings, Wirtz is starting to show promising signs, but still nowhere near what you want. Hopefully that comes in the second half of the season.
“Isak for me — I just could never get my head around the signing. Liverpool were always the type of club who bought the next Isak. The next Isak in their mind was Ekitike. So I don’t know why you would then buy Isak. He’s been very unlucky with a bad injury. But he was injury-prone at (previous club) Newcastle. He looked a fantastic player, but I just don’t see how you were ever going to get a £125million striker and a £69m striker (Ekitike) in the team at the same time. Especially when you buy Wirtz as a No 10.
Alexander Isak limps off injured against Tottenham (Justin Tallis/AFP via Getty Images)
“Then they didn’t replace Luis Diaz, which was a problem. The great players from last year just haven’t performed. So the five big decisions they made all blew up in their face. That’s why we find ourselves here.”
This year, Carragher believes Liverpool’s most important summer signing could be in central midfield.
“Curtis Jones and Alexis Mac Allister are really good players, but it ends up with two or three players who do not have great physicality in there,” he adds. “The one who stands out every time I watch him play is Declan Rice. What a player, honest to god. That’s exactly what Liverpool need. For me, he is the modern-day Roy Keane.
“I don’t think he’s a Stevie Gerrard, because Stevie was more attacking. Roy did a bit of everything; press high, get the ball off the back four, everything. Declan has the set pieces, too. I actually don’t think we still give him enough praise. It always feels like there’s a but with him. His passing is fantastic. No one can run past him. His set-piece delivery is as good as anything in European football.
He sighs. “Why Liverpool didn’t go for him… The summer he was available (when Arsenal bought him from West Ham in July 2023), was the summer we were going to get rid of (veteran midfield duo) Jordan Henderson and Fabinho. My argument at the time was you buy one player (in Rice) to replace two, because he could do both the Fabinho role and also the Henderson one, pressing high, as he shows for Arsenal. Oh god, I’d have loved to have got him in a Liverpool shirt.
“For me, he’s Player of the Year this year, especially if Arsenal win the league. Then he will get the real love he deserves, and hopefully he will go and have a great World Cup (with England), too.”