Andy Robertson Reflects on Liverpool's Loss of Edge After Jota's Death

Andy Robertson has laid bare just how deeply Liverpool were scarred by the death of Diogo Jota, admitting the squad “didn’t care about football” for months and “lost their edge” during a season that ended with Arne Slot losing his job.

Jota was killed in a car crash in Spain in July 2025, along with his brother Andre Silva, as they travelled back to England ahead of pre-season. Liverpool were reigning Premier League champions, primed to defend their title. The tragedy ripped the heart out of the dressing room before a ball had even been kicked.

“It’s difficult to describe or talk about, really, because what we went through, it was horrendous,” Robertson said on the Stick to Football Podcast on Disney+. “Say if I'm talking about the new signings, they're coming into a club that is heartbroken.

“They’re trying, and that’s where I felt so sorry for these guys because they'd signed and they were signing for big money and all that, if I'm talking about football. It took them months to settle in because we didn't care, we didn't care about football.

“That was the truth of it. We didn't care about football because you've just lost one of your best mates in the changing room.”

The standards that had defined Liverpool’s rise under Jürgen Klopp and then into the Slot era suddenly felt out of reach.

“That's why I probably have so much sympathy in football terms towards the new signings, because I think they came into a team that was, like... we were elite in everything that we did for years,” Robertson said. “And maybe we couldn't be that because of what had happened. And then they then started getting quite a lot of criticism.

“And that's why I think these lads will be absolutely fine at Liverpool. I would treat this season as their first season. That's the way I would do it.”

‘We Lost That Determination’

Robertson did not dress it up. The emotional hit translated directly onto the pitch.

“I think all footballers, we all have that edge, don't we? And I think when you lose that edge sometimes then you can't perform to the best. And I think last season we lost the edge,” he admitted.

“I think when I look back on it now, I think we lost that determination a little bit and things like that because I know at times we were maybe going, ‘You know what, what's the point?’

“Like look at what Jota's family are going through. Look at his kids. But yeah, we were grieving. It was our mate at the end of the day. He’s not a footballer to us, he was a teammate, he was a friend.

“So, yeah, for us it was incredibly difficult. The week before he died, I was at his wedding. So that's one of the most difficult things you'll ever go through. Seeing him on the happiest day of his life, and then the next week you're seeing his family torn apart.”

Liverpool would stumble through a fractured campaign, finishing fifth in the Premier League. Slot paid with his job at the end of the season, but inside the club the story felt far more complex than a simple case of a champion losing its way.

Slot’s Response and a Broken Pre-Season

Robertson was quick to praise Slot’s handling of the squad in the raw aftermath of Jota’s death, even as results later turned against the Dutchman.

“We spoke a lot (in pre-season). The manager was really good, to be fair,” Robertson recalled. “Like our pre-season was barely anything because, to be fair to Arne, he was like, ‘If you don't want to train, you don't train.’

“Say one day you come in and you're struggling or whatever, that was his attitude of the pre-season.”

The club’s psychologist became a key figure, creating spaces for players to talk rather than train.

“We had a psychologist that worked in the club anyway and he kind of set up little groups and it would just be like, if you want to grab a coffee and come round and talk and things like that.

“So we did that quite a few times, and I think that helped. But it was incredibly difficult times.”

Every conversation, Robertson said, kept circling back to the same thought: whatever the players were going through, Jota’s family were living something far worse.

“But then you always just feel sorry for his family, for his wife. At the end of the day, their life got flipped completely upside down.

“Ours, we were heartbroken and everything like that, but for them daily, it must be so difficult even now.

“We managed to get through it together, I think, and we always just said, ‘Look, we'll always remember him,’ and everything like that.

“But we had to play football at the end of the day. We didn't have a choice in that. We tried to do it as best we could and that's why last season was so tough.”

From Open-Top Parade to Funeral Flight

Robertson drew a brutal contrast between the euphoria of the previous May and the devastation of that summer.

“It's a difficult one. At the end of the day, football's based on results, and we didn't get enough results. And that was the fact,” he said.

“But if you go back to the summer before, we have the biggest parade in Liverpool's history, right? We're on the open-top bus, we're going through the city centre, and I think over a million people had come out and seen us.

“The next day, we all shake each other's hands, we all go off for the summer. The next time we see everyone is at the airport heading over to Porto for his funeral. That's the next time I see all my teammates.

“So, from going from the highest of highs in terms of being on a parade with the Premier League trophy, and you're parading it round thousands and thousands of fans, to then seeing staff and players the way we were, like that, it's not normal.

“It's not normal what we went through. So, I think could it have been factored in? Yeah, maybe it could have.”

The season, though, did not pause. The games kept coming. So did the scrutiny.

“But then when the season goes on and things like that, we know that we then have to do better and we need to win games and things like that.

“And I get why then there was a lot of frustration around the way we were playing, the results that we were getting. I can understand it.”

Fast Start, Cracks Beneath the Surface

Liverpool actually opened the league campaign like a side ready to defend their crown. Five wins from five, talk of another title charge, the machine seemingly still humming.

Inside the dressing room, Robertson insists, it felt different.

“But what I would say is at the time at the start, the manager was really good and he helped us a lot,” he said of Slot. “He understood the situation in terms of pre-season, in terms of not pushing us too hard, not trying to cause too much competitiveness or whatever, in case somebody was struggling that day or whatever.

“And, we then were starting slow, but we then go and win the first five games, and everyone thinks Liverpool are going to win the league again.

“We won the first five games but we were probably covering over the cracks at that point. And then after the international break, the cracks came.”

Liverpool now move forward without Slot, still carrying the memory of Jota and the scars of a year that began with a funeral instead of a fresh start. The question is no longer just whether they can reclaim their edge, but what this version of Liverpool will look like when they finally do.