Liverpool's Manager Provides No Excuses and Vows to Plot Route From Malaise
Arne Slot stated he had to “look at myself” after the Reds endured a sixth defeat in seven English top-flight games on their own turf against Nottingham Forest and insisted he would discover a solution out of the title holders' slump.
Nottingham Forest, fighting against the drop before kick off, delivered the biggest win at Liverpool's stadium in their history as Liverpool slipped to an 8th loss in 11 fixtures in all competitions. The most expensive domestic acquisition, Alexander Isak, was again unnoticeable and the home side contended the defender's first goal should have been ruled out for comparable grounds to Virgil van Dijk’s disallowed effort versus City before the international break. But the manager admitted the buck stopped with him and made no excuses.
“No one wishes to listen to me now talking about refereeing decisions if you lose 3-0 in your own stadium 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 score can change the flow of a match. Before I was just waiting for us to net a goal. Later we hardly created any chances.
“Of course there is a path forward, particularly with the quality players we have. No matter if you win or are beaten when you look back you are always considering: ‘In which areas can we do better, in what aspects can we make changes?’ but that is different from questioning yourself.
“I wish to stress I am accountable for the current defeats. You are answerable when you are winning but also liable when you are losing. I can never provide enough excuses for us to have the results we have. That is far from good enough and I am to blame for that.”
Liverpool’s performance fell apart as Slot made multiple attacking changes when chasing the game. “It was the identical away at Forest the previous campaign,” he said. “I substituted the French defender off and put on the Portuguese forward and he scored straight away to equalize at 1-1. At that time it was courageous, currently it’s probably stupid.”
The Anfield side previously were defeated in back-to-back home league fixtures by Forest in the sixties. The last time they lost back-to-back league games by a 3-0 margin was in the mid-60s.
The manager said: “It was extremely poor. Playing on home soil, losing 3-0 no matter which team you encounter is a very, very bad outcome. Unexpected if you consider the opening 30 minutes of the match. I haven’t seen us creating so many chances in the initial 30 minutes maybe the whole season, and the first time they arrived in our penalty area they found the back of the net.
“It did not happen at City, but in every other game we have been the dominant side and were able to generate opportunities. Recently it is nearly consistently that we fail to convert our chances and the ones we allow find the net.”