Arne Slot admits Liverpool 'crumbled' in 'damaging' Aston Villa defeat

Arne Slot reacts after his Liverpool side were beaten 4-2 at top-five rivals Aston Villa in the Premier League at Villa Park

Arne Slot admits Liverpool “crumbled” in the second half against Aston Villa as they saw their hopes of Champions League qualification suffer a “damaging” blow.

The Reds were thumped 4-2 at Villa Park on Friday evening as they missed the opportunity guarantee a top-five Premier League finish.

After Virgil van Dijk had equalised Morgan Rogers’ opener at the start of the second half, a mistake from Dominik Szoboszlai invited Ollie Watkins to put Villa back ahead.

The Midlanders then took advantage of a poor Liverpool reaction with Watkins and John McGinn striking further goals to render Van Dijk’s injury-time second meaningless.

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OPINION

Slot’s side now need to beat Brentford at home on the final day to secure a Champions League berth, although they will be spared a nervy finale if Bournemouth and Brighton both fail to beat Manchester City at home and Leeds United away respectively in the coming days.

But of a 12th league loss of the season - their worst record since 2014/15 - Slot said: “It’s damaging because we needed either a win or maybe, maybe, maybe two draws would have been enough as well.

“But now we know one thing for sure - we need a win next week if we have to do it ourselves. As we know, the other teams of course need to pick up points as well for us to need a win. That’s really damaging that we were not able to get a result let alone a win here today.

“There were parts in the game where I felt a result could have gone our way but I think people are mainly focused on the period after the 2-1 where we couldn’t find any momentum anymore and we conceded two other goals. That was the most difficult period in the game.

"But after the 2-1 we crumbled, and we struggled. In the end we came back to 4-2, so they (the players) did not give up, but we struggled to control their pace, intensity and quality.”

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Asked if he was frustrated Liverpool have been hampered by the same failings this season, Slot added: “It is frustrating because as a manager you are also responsible for if things happen time and time again you are hired to try to prevent that for the next time.

“We scored two set-pieces over here so usually you think if you go to any game where you score two set-pieces usually, usually you are quite sure of a result unless you concede three set-pieces like we did.

“Against (Manchester) United and Chelsea and this game again we have a negative balance in set-pieces, which makes it really hard if you play against equal teams like United, Chelsea and Villa are to win a game of football.

“Again that was shown today, and the manner in which we conceded the 2-1, I think we thought we had seen a lot this season, but this one we hadn’t.

“Dominik has had a very good season and he doesn’t do it on purpose and he’s the first one who feels s**t about it.

“But it happened and then afterwards we really, really, really struggled to find any momentum.”

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