Andoni Iraola returns to Bournemouth on Sunday for the first time since leaving the club he called home for three years. This time he arrives as Liverpool head coach, having signed a two-year deal in the summer after replacing Arne Slot at Anfield.
The turnaround is a striking one. Only 12 months ago Liverpool had won each of their first five Premier League games and appeared to be on their way to defending their crown under Slot. That run began with a victory over a Bournemouth side led by Iraola on the opening night of the season. Few, if any, would have predicted then that Iraola would end up succeeding Slot on Merseyside.
It is too early to pass judgement on the 44-year-old, even if his Liverpool side are already six points worse off than they were at this stage last season. The Reds remain unbeaten under him, and the wider picture is one of a team that has at least stopped losing regularly after suffering 12 league defeats last term. Iraola himself has not lost a Premier League game since January across his two clubs. Even so, as vice-captain Alisson said last week, draws are not good enough for Liverpool — and last weekend’s goalless draw with Fulham underlined that.
Sunday’s visit to the Vitality Stadium will carry some novelty. Bournemouth have had to renovate the smaller away changing room to comply with Europa League regulations, so Iraola can at least expect a more pleasant experience there than he would previously have had. He will also have taken note of Bournemouth’s Europa League bow on Thursday, when the Cherries beat Real Sociedad in the Basque region where he grew up.
Off the pitch, Iraola has swapped the seaside on the south coast for the beach town of Formby, where former Liverpool managers Jurgen Klopp and Brendan Rodgers also resided. By all accounts he is settling in well, having been spotted in the city centre on a few occasions, and as a keen cyclist he has enjoyed the coastal routes.
But he is most at home on the training ground. Those at Liverpool describe him as very much a ‘six days a week’ coach, so passionate about the craft that he is often the first on the training pitch, marking out the cones for sessions. “It’s really intense. There’s a lot of hard work and no sort of light days. Everyone’s putting in 100%,” said forward Lewis Koumas.
At the AXA Training Centre in Kirkby, Iraola rarely uses his own office and is often found in the coaches room where his assistants Tommy Elphick, Shaun Cooper and Pablo de la Torre are based. He keeps a relatively low-key presence around the building compared with previous managers. De la Torre, who moved with Iraola from Rayo Vallecano to Bournemouth in 2023, is viewed as a key pillar in ensuring the players meet the physical standard the head coach demands.
In terms of actual changes inside the club, they are not as significant as outsiders might assume, given the structured nature of the head coach role. Iraola’s appointment was based on his fine work at Bournemouth, but he is very much learning on the job when it comes to handling Liverpool’s congested schedule. There is a willingness to listen to other departments, including the medical and fitness teams, as the Reds manage a squad that will play at least 49 games this season — a figure that could climb into the 60s depending on cup runs. His training schedule is adapted in line with the kick-off time of the following fixture, with late afternoon and early evening sessions increasingly common. Under Slot, Liverpool tended to train at a similar time each day.
There have also been conversations with the academy and with Rob Page, who coaches Liverpool Under-21s, to ensure the playing principles filter through the club. “We have an understanding of how the first team play and key principles, like how we press, how he [Iraola] wants his number 10 to press, how he wants his number eight to press, how he wants his centre-backs to press — we mirror that absolutely,” Page said. Earlier this week Dominik Szoboszlai explained how Liverpool play with a number six, a number eight and a number 10, and despite calls from fans for a defensive midfielder during the transfer window, Iraola’s system can work if everyone improves collectively.
His methods extend to how he manages the week of a match. Iraola prefers to name his team on the morning of the game and saves the post-match debrief with his players for the day after the match. There is pragmatism in his media dealings too, after comments he made to LFC TV following a pre-season friendly against Monaco were widely reported. Iraola had conceded that Liverpool ran out of steam after 30 minutes and did not have the energy levels at that point to play with the intensity he wants — not a dig at his players, but an admission that the intensity was still being built. There is a realisation that at a club like Liverpool, every word can end up shared across social media and interpreted differently. Even so, he comes across as calm in his news conferences and open to discussion. It is very much a case of Iraola adapting to the club as much as the other way round.
One of the main reasons Liverpool went for him was his ability to develop young talent. The average age of their players in the Premier League this season is 25.3, with only five teams boasting a lower figure. Rio Ngumoha, 18, Trey Nyoni, 19, and Koumas, 20, all started against Tottenham in the Carabao Cup, and all three are expected to play bigger roles this season than last.
Intensity is the buzzword under Iraola and it is non-negotiable, but he is already aware that such a brutal schedule will force Liverpool to find ways to adapt and occasionally win games through a set-piece or a moment of individual brilliance. Going into this weekend they have made the most sprints in the Premier League, yet they looked flat against Fulham last weekend in that goalless draw, less than 72 hours after beating Atletico Madrid in the Champions League. Sunday’s game at Bournemouth will be their fourth in 12 days, and after the international break they face four games in 10 days. Between 11 October and 7 November they play nine times.
Liverpool have not exactly had a dream start under Iraola, but they are yet to lose. Becoming a team that is hard to beat is undoubtedly a step in the right direction after 12 league losses last term, and a win on familiar territory on Sunday would be the perfect way for Iraola to head into the international break.