Liverpool's Manager Offers No Excuses and Pledges to Plot Way Out of Malaise

Arne Slot stated he had to “examine my own performance” after the Reds suffered a 6th defeat in 7 English top-flight games on their own turf to Nottingham Forest and insisted he would find a way from the title holders' slump.

Nottingham Forest, fighting against the drop prior to the match, produced the biggest victory at Liverpool's stadium in their history as the Merseyside club slipped to an eighth loss in 11 matches in every tournament. The most expensive domestic acquisition, Alexander Isak, was again anonymous and the home side argued the defender's opener ought to have been disallowed for similar reasons to Virgil van Dijk’s disallowed effort against City prior to the international break. But Slot admitted the responsibility stopped with him and offered no alibis.

“Nobody wants to hear me now speaking about officiating calls if you are defeated 3-0 at home to Forest,” said the Liverpool head coach. “I ought to examine myself initially and my squad, but it demonstrates you how a goal can change the momentum of a match. Before I was just hoping for us to net a strike. Later we barely created anything.

“Naturally there is a path forward, particularly with the quality players we have. Regardless if you win or lose when you reflect you are always thinking: ‘In which areas can we do better, in what aspects can we adjust?’ but that is something else from doubting yourself.

“I want to stress I am responsible for the current losses. You are responsible when you are victorious but also responsible when you are losing. I can never provide sufficient excuses for us to have the results we have. That is far from acceptable and I am responsible for that.”

The team's performance fell apart as Slot introduced several attacking changes when chasing the match. “It was the same away at Forest the previous campaign,” he remarked. “I substituted the French defender off and put on [Diogo] Jota and he scored immediately to make it 1-1. At that time it was courageous, now it’s likely stupid.”

Liverpool last lost back-to-back at Anfield league games against Forest in 1963. The most recent occasion they suffered back-to-back top-flight games by a 3-0 margin was in 1965.

Slot commented: “It was very bad. Competing on home soil, conceding 3-0 regardless of which opponent you face is a terrible outcome. Unexpected if you look at the first half-hour of the game. I haven’t seen us creating so many chances in the initial half-hour maybe the entire season, and the initial occasion they arrived in our box they scored.

“It wasn’t against Manchester City, but in every other game we have been the controlling team and were capable to create chances. Recently it is almost constantly that we miss our opportunities and the ones we allow find the net.”