Liverpool's Manager Offers Zero Justifications and Vows to Find Route Out of Slump
Liverpool's head coach declared he needed to “examine my own performance” after the Reds endured a 6th defeat in seven Premier League matches at home against Forest and insisted he would find a way out of the champions’ slump.
Nottingham Forest, in the relegation zone prior to the match, delivered the largest win at Anfield in their history as Liverpool slipped to an 8th defeat in 11 fixtures in all competitions. The most expensive domestic acquisition, Alexander Isak, was again unnoticeable and Liverpool argued the defender's opener ought to have been ruled out for comparable grounds to Virgil van Dijk’s disallowed effort against Manchester City before the national team pause. But the manager conceded the responsibility rested with him and made no excuses.
“No one wants to hear me now speaking about refereeing decisions if you are defeated 3-0 at home to Nottingham Forest,” said the Reds' boss. “I should look at my own role first and my squad, but it does show you how a goal can alter the flow of a game. Before I was just hoping for us to score a strike. Afterwards we barely created anything.
“Of course there is a path forward, particularly with the quality players we have. No matter if you triumph or are beaten when you look back you are always thinking: ‘In which areas can we do better, where can we adjust?’ but that is different from questioning yourself.
“I wish to stress I am accountable for the current defeats. You are answerable when you are victorious but also responsible when you are losing. I can never provide sufficient excuses for us to have the outcomes we have. That is far from acceptable and I am to blame for that.”
The team's performance fell apart as the coach made several offensive changes when chasing the match. “It was the identical on the road at Forest the previous campaign,” he remarked. “I took Ibou [Ibrahima Konaté] off and brought on the Portuguese forward and he scored straight away to make it 1-1. At that time it was courageous, currently it’s likely stupid.”
The Anfield side previously were defeated in back-to-back at Anfield Premier League fixtures against Nottingham Forest in 1963. The most recent occasion they suffered consecutive top-flight games by a 3-0 margin was in the mid-60s.
Slot said: “It was extremely poor. Competing at home, conceding 3-0 no matter which team you encounter is a terrible result. Surprising if you look at the first half-hour of the match. I haven’t seen us producing so many chances in the opening half-hour perhaps the entire campaign, and the first time they entered in our penalty area they scored.
“It did not happen against Manchester City, but in every other fixture we have been the controlling team and were capable to create chances. Recently it is almost consistently that we fail to convert our chances and the ones we concede find the net.”