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Arne Slot declared he had to “examine my own performance” following the Reds suffered a 6th defeat in 7 English top-flight games at home to Nottingham Forest and affirmed he would find a solution out of the title holders' poor run.

Forest, in the relegation zone before kick off, produced the biggest victory at Anfield in their history as Liverpool fell to an 8th defeat in 11 matches in every tournament. The most expensive domestic acquisition, the Swedish striker, was again unnoticeable and Liverpool contended Murillo’s opener ought to have been disallowed for similar reasons to Virgil van Dijk’s chalked-off goal versus City before the national team pause. But Slot conceded the buck stopped with him and made no excuses.

“Nobody wishes to listen to me now speaking about refereeing decisions if you are defeated 3-0 at home to Nottingham Forest,” said the Liverpool head coach. “I ought to examine my own role initially and my team, but it demonstrates you how a goal can change the flow of a match. Earlier I was just waiting for us to net a strike. Afterwards we barely created any chances.

“Of course there is a way out, particularly with the quality footballers we have. Regardless if you win or are beaten when you look back you are always thinking: ‘In which areas can we do better, in what aspects can we make changes?’ but that is something else from questioning your abilities.

“I wish to emphasise I am accountable for the current losses. You are responsible when you are victorious but also liable when you are defeated. I can not provide enough reasons for us to have the results we have. That is not good enough and I am to blame for that.”

The team's performance unravelled as the coach introduced several offensive substitutions when pursuing the game. “It was the same away at Forest the previous campaign,” he said. “I took Ibou [Ibrahima Konaté] off and put on [Diogo] Jota and he found the net straight away to equalize at 1-1. At that time it was brave, now it’s likely stupid.”

The Anfield side previously were defeated in two successive at Anfield Premier League games against Nottingham Forest in 1963. The last time they suffered consecutive top-flight games by a three-goal scoreline was in the mid-60s.

The manager commented: “It was very bad. Playing on home soil, conceding 3-0 regardless of which opponent you encounter is a very, very bad result. Unexpected if you look at the first half-hour of the game. I did not witness us producing so much in the initial 30 minutes perhaps the entire campaign, and the first time they entered in our penalty area they scored.

“It did not happen against Manchester City, but in every other fixture we have been the controlling side and were capable to generate chances. Recently it is almost consistently that we miss our chances and the ones we concede find the net.”