Arne Slot admits he now faces one of his toughest tests as Liverpool head coach after Manchester United secured their first victory at Anfield in more than nine years, handing the struggling Premier League champions a fourth consecutive defeat in all competitions.
Liverpool once again paid the price for poor finishing and another costly free-kick failure, as Ruben Amorim celebrated successive league victories for the first time since taking charge at Old Trafford.
Harry Maguire’s late 84th-minute header sealed a 2-1 victory for United, and the defender admitted after the match that it was “embarrassing” that it took the club 51 games to finally achieve that feat under Amorim.
Slot, meanwhile, could only reflect on a performance where his side dominated the chances but failed to make them count.
Cody Gakpo hit the woodwork three times and missed a golden opportunity to level the score late on, as Liverpool slipped to yet another defeat following recent defeats against Crystal Palace, Galatasaray and Chelsea.
“As a manager, you’re constantly faced with challenges,” Slot said. “When you’re starting out and you need to win games, when you go to a bigger club, when you’re Jurgen Klopp’s successor and people say: ‘This is the biggest challenge you’ve ever faced.’ Now we have lost four times in a row and that is also a challenge. The life of a football manager is also a constant challenge.
“But are we losing confidence? I don’t see it yet because every game we’ve lost, we’ve been able to create an incredible number of chances in the second half. If we can continue to produce what we’re doing and maybe do some things a little bit better, then there’s every reason to hope that we’ll win football games again.
“Of course, there’s also the fact that apart from the two goals we conceded, we conceded maybe two or three more chances. That’s constantly the struggle we have when we’re down 1-0, so you have to take a little more risk.”
Slot also expressed frustration that play was allowed to continue during the build-up to Bryan Mbeumo’s opener, insisting that referee Michael Oliver should have stopped the match when Alexis Mac Allister suffered a head injury. The midfielder required four stitches following the incident.
“The main thing I should do right now is not complain about this stuff,” Slot said. “We should have done a lot better after Macca was on the pitch, but player health care is important and if a player needs four stitches you hope everyone understands he needs treatment.
“But we could have done better and that’s not the reason why we lost. The reason is that we missed too many chances to win a football match.”
