Alan Shearer names two Liverpool players who were 'terrible' against Brentford in damning verdict

Shearer

Alan Shearer and Micah Richards have outlined the problems Liverpool boss Arne Slot must address following their fourth consecutive defeat in the Premier League.

Saturday night's 3-2 loss at Brentford marked their fourth successive Premier League defeat, as they now sit seventh in the standings.

Slot is facing the biggest test of his Anfieldreign, and the issues are piling up.

Slot: "Teams have a certain playing style against us, which is a very good strategy to play, and we haven’t found an answer yet,"

"Going down 1-0 every time doesn’t help either. Teams know which strategy to play against us.

"Even when we didn’t play well today, we still scored twice from open play, but you can’t compete up there (at the top of the table) because we simply concede too many goals."

In nine matches, the Reds have leaked 14 goals, and Shearer said on the Rest in Football podcast: "Where do we start? I mean, no one saw this coming.

Shearer

"I think the vast majority of people, the vast majority of pundits - I can't remember any pundits that said Liverpool would have problems defensively.

“Like, all you remember people saying, because of the squad they've got, because of their investment and players they've signed, is that they were the team to beat.

"But they are so bad all over the pitch. I mean, say what you want about them in midfield and lack of protection up front, the lack of connection between their signings,

“but defensively, 'Oh my word.' I mean, [Virgil] van Dijk and [Ibrahima] Konate, the two fullbacks, have had a lot of stick and a lot of criticism, and I understand that.

“But the two centre halves, they are all over the place, they've been terrible and they were at Brentford. They were awful, both of them. I mean, Van Dijk and Konate."

Meanwhile, Richards went on to address the challenges the team is currently facing, saying:

Richards:"They were, and I think what was we're seeing now is, Van Dijk needs help.

“How many times, in previous seasons, Van Dijk bailed them out? You look at partnerships and we've always talked about Van Dijk and how good he is, he needs Konate to bail him out at the moment and that's not happening so you have two centre halves not playing well at the same time.

"If you look at the tactical view, it's midfield. It's the midfield area, [Alexis] Mac Allister was protection for them, [Ryan] Gravenberch was protection and Dominik [Szoboszlai] has legs last season.

Now it's completely different - they're trying to go with Curtis Jones, very good player but he's not got the defensive qualities over midfielders I've mentioned.

"[Florian] Wirtz as well. We know Wirtz will come a good player, we know that, they need to find somewhere in the team where he can excel.

“If you're a midfielder now and you're playing up against Wirtz, you're worried about what he can do on the ball but off the ball, he's small, he's petite, he's not very strong, he's come from a different league, you're going to expose that and that's what teams are doing now. It's energy in midfield why Liverpoolweren't so consistent."

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