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Under-pressure Liverpool boss Arne Slot admits he feels 'guilty' at Liverpool's 'ridiculous' slump this season.
The Reds' title defence in the Premier League has started catastrophically, with the 3-0 defeat by Nottingham Forest at Anfield particularly galling at the weekend.
Slot has presided over six losses in the last seven top flight games to find himself under the kind of pressure that was almost unimaginable after spearheading a title triumph last term.
When asked about the club's and his predicament ahead of the Champions League clash with PSV on Wednesday, he said in an answer translated from Dutch: 'It is a ridiculous situation almost, something I didn't expect to be in, especially if you manage at Liverpool, it is unbelievable.
'If you can find an excuse, there will never be enough that you perform like this. It is unexpected for the club, for me, everyone but if there was ever a club you need to work at to face this it is this one.
'We are working together to achieve what this club should achieve.'
Arne Slot admitted that Liverpool's slump in form this season has been 'ridiculous'
Mo Salah and Co were in training on Tuesday ahead of Wednesday's Champions League game
When asked about how he is dealing with the pressure from a personal point of view, he added: 'In order to stay calm, I don't find it difficult, it sits in my character, most people would say I'm a calm person.
'This is not a nice situation, it is not nice to lose, especially at Liverpool and I didn't expect it myself with the way we go about it tactically and the quality of players we have.
'It is lower than the level we expected. I take responsibility and feel guilty for it. We are working on it, I am at a club where we're going to give extra effort, as a trainer I try to lead by example and be really well prepared.
'It is not acceptable at a club like Liverpool and we have to do the simple things better, that is quite easy to solve.
'Every day you have to prove yourself at a club of this level. If you work at this level the next game is the most important for me and the players. You can never rest if things go well and definitely if things don't.
'I don't know if I have to prove myself to the fans as much as I need to prove to myself and everyone involved in the football club.'
While there are many issues for Slot to fix, he sees the most glaringly obvious one as how the team are defending in comparison to last season.
'Last season, we conceded zero set piece to now, this season we've conceded nine', he went on.
Joe Gomez (left) is in the squad for the game but had an injection in his knee last week
'It is close to ridiculous for a club like us. There are more details that are different but the biggest thing is the goals we concede that is not of our standards.'
Liverpool floundered after conceding the opener against Forest and their confidence looks undeniably shaky after such a sustained run of poor form, but Slot was pleased with how his team started the game.
'Until now confidence hasn't been an issue if you look at the way we play most parts of the game, on Saturday the first half hour was everything I hope except for scoring a goal, ' he explained.
'The first time they arrive with a set piece they score and it took a while to recover and after half time we concede again. I saw a team trying a lot, how many crosses we gave, six or seven times Forest but they defended their box much better.
'We have to help ourselves defensively, the whole team, maybe people also see on the ball we aren't doing so many things different, but the goals we concede is different.
'We haven't lost the ability to fight for duels, in moments we've lost too many. We had 75 percent of the possession (against Forest) but only had to defend our box a few times, so it is not that we don't defend well enough, we only have to defend a few times. In moments we have to defend better.'
Next up for the Reds is PSV in the Champions League on Wednesday evening at Anfield.
The Dutch side are comfortably in mid table in Europe and flying high domestically, six points clear of Feyenoord at the top.
Liverpool fell to yet another defeat this season when they were beaten by Nottingham Forest
They could pose plenty of problems to Liverpool, who will be without injured Florian Wirtz, Conor Bradley and Jeremie Frimpong.
Joe Gomez is in contention to play, but Slot revealed the Englishman received an injection last week.
#Gomez is one of the five defenders we have, normally I wouldn't go into detail but he had an injection last week on his knee', he revealed.
'Apart from making a decision to play Dom or someone else, Gomez is also not completely fit although he is in the group.'
