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Arne Slot declared he needed to “look at myself” following the Reds suffered a 6th defeat in 7 English top-flight matches at home to Nottingham Forest and insisted he would find a way from the champions’ poor run.

Nottingham Forest, fighting against the drop before kick off, delivered the biggest victory at Anfield in their history as the Merseyside club slipped to an eighth loss in eleven fixtures in every tournament. The British record signing, Alexander Isak, was once more anonymous and Liverpool contended Murillo’s opener should have been ruled out for similar reasons to Virgil van Dijk’s disallowed effort versus City prior to the national team pause. But the manager conceded the buck stopped with him and offered no alibis.

“Nobody wants to listen to me now speaking about refereeing decisions if you are defeated 3-0 at home to Forest,” said the Liverpool head coach. “I ought to examine myself first and my team, but it demonstrates you how a score can alter the momentum of a match. Earlier I was just waiting for us to net a strike. Afterwards we barely generated anything.

“Of course there is a path forward, especially with the talented footballers we have. No matter if you win or are beaten when you look back you are always considering: ‘In which areas can we do better, where can we adjust?’ but that is different from questioning your abilities.

“I want to stress I am responsible for the present losses. You are answerable when you are victorious but also responsible when you are losing. I can not come up with enough excuses for us to have the results we have. That is far from acceptable and I am to blame for that.”

The team's performance unravelled as Slot introduced multiple offensive changes when pursuing the game. “It was the same on the road at Forest last season,” he remarked. “I substituted Ibou [Ibrahima Konaté] out and brought on [Diogo] Jota and he scored straight away to equalize at 1-1. At that time it was courageous, now it’s probably stupid.”

Liverpool last lost two successive at Anfield Premier League games against Forest in 1963. The last time they lost back-to-back top-flight games by a three-goal scoreline was in the mid-60s.

The manager said: “It was very bad. Competing on home soil, conceding 3-0 regardless of which opponent you encounter is a very, very bad outcome. Surprising if you look at the first half-hour of the game. I did not witness us creating so much in the opening 30 minutes perhaps the whole campaign, and the first time they arrived in our penalty area they scored.

“It did not happen at City, but in every other fixture we have been the controlling team and were able to create opportunities. Recently it is nearly consistently that we miss our chances and the attempts we allow find the net.”