Arne Slot has admitted he feels guilty about Liverpool’s “ridiculous” slump, a collapse that no one at the club envisaged, and said he must prove himself to everyone at Anfield on a daily basis.
Slot is dealing with the worst run of his managerial career after Nottingham Forest inflicted a sixth defeat in seven Premier League games, and eighth defeat in 11 matches in all competitions, on the champions on Saturday. Cody Gakpo described the 3-0 reverse at home to Sean Dyche’s team as a “kind of embarrassment”.
Liverpool host PSV Eindhoven in the Champions League on Wednesday and Slot revealed their predicament has stunned the entire club. Asked to describe the situation, the Dutchman replied: “Ridiculous, almost. Something I didn’t expect to be in, not at any club I worked at let alone if you are the manager of Liverpool. That is unbelievable.
“It is unexpected for the club, for me, for everyone, but we are also working at a club that if you ever needed to face this maybe this is the best club to face it because the harder it gets at a club like this more we are together, the more we are trying to do the things Liverpool usually achieves.”
Slot cancelled an appearance at the Northern Football Writers’ Association awards ceremony in Manchester on Sunday to spend more time working on a solution to Liverpool’s collapse in form. He had been due to collect the association’s award for manager of the year.
“I don’t find it that difficult to stay calm, it’s in my character,” the 47-year-old manager said. “Most people would describe me as a calm person. These situations, it’s not really nice is it? It’s not nice to lose, especially at such a club like Liverpool.
“To be honest, I didn’t expect myself to be in this situation with the way we go about things tactically and the quality of players we have. You would never have expected us to have lost so much. You can use facts and figures, you can say it’s the sixth match we’ve lost out of seven in Premier League and I can say in the last four matches we’ve lost two, and in the Champions League we’ve won three. But it’s lower than the level expected at Liverpool. For sure I take the responsibility and I feel guilty for it.”
Despite winning the Premier League title in his debut season, Slot claimed that he has to prove himself every day at Liverpool. “You cannot say: ‘We won the league’, or ‘We did this or that’ and now it’s OK,” he said. “If you work at this level the next game is always the most important and you have to prove yourself every single time.
“That is for me, for the players and that is what we like about working in this environment – that you can never rest and you always have to keep going, especially if things don’t go well. I don’t know if I have to prove myself to the fans as well as I have to prove myself to myself and the players and to everyone involved in the football club.”
Virgil van Dijk said Liverpool were “in a mess” and questioned whether every player was taking responsibility for poor results in the wake of the Forest defeat. Gakpo insisted the captain’s message was taken on board by the rest of the dressing room.
“After the game on Saturday it was a kind of embarrassment because we lost 3-0 at home in front of our own fans,” the forward said.
“In the days after that we were … I don’t want to say angry, but we tried to speak together and be honest with each other about what we have to do to perform better on the pitch. We also know we have to stick together.
“Everybody is aware we have to take responsibility on and off the pitch. This was a conversation you have with a teammate. It wasn’t really a ‘meeting meeting’ but we are aware we have to take responsibility, that we have to do better with certain things on the pitch. That’s what we spoke about. We are honest because otherwise there’s no point in speaking.”
