The Reds sit in fourth place - 12 points behind leaders Arsenal - at the halfway point of the Premier League campaign and the coach feels that the position is a fair reflection of what has been a challenging title defence.

Slot said: "Realistically I think there are two teams [Arsenal and Manchester City], with (Aston) Villa being really, really close to them because Arsenal against Villa they created a bit of a gap to Villa but realistically those two teams are quite far away from us and we should not look at those two at this moment in time.

"We have had our struggles throughout. We started really well in terms of results, games were really close, then we had a phase of the season where games were still really close but we were constantly unlucky, now we have been seven or eight games in a row unbeaten but if you say this you feel like, 'They are flying through the league', but that is not what we are doing."

Slot believes that the margins in the Premier League are closer than ever and feels that his team have been involved in several close games this term.

The Dutch manager said: "Every single game we play it's hard work, it's two teams quite close to each other. We are mainly the team that is probably better than the other team but not enough.

"We are constantly within this 20 per cent difference and if you are inside this 20 per cent difference then going to the floor or not means a lot for the results and I will keep pushing and the players will keep pushing to get to a situation where we are more than that 20 per cent and we can make the difference bigger and hopefully we can find a moment where we can fly through the season but for the first 19 games it has been a constant battle, close to each other, sometimes a bit lucky, sometimes a bit unlucky season."