Arn Slott watched as Liverpool suffered a 3-0 defeat at Nottingham Forest on Saturday, their second successive Premier League defeat, before skipping the awards ceremony.
Gary McAllister was called to accept the award on Arn Slott’s behalf just as he was watching Leeds United play Aston Villa on Sunday. Despite winning the Northern Football Writers’ Association Manager of the Year award for his performances last season, Slott decided not to attend Sunday’s ceremony.
Instead, on very short notice, McAllister was sent to accept the award on the Dutchman’s behalf. According to the Daily Mail, Mr Slott confirmed he would not be attending the 4pm ceremony on Sunday, while Mr McAllister received a phone call midway through Leeds’ Premier League game against Aston Villa at Elland Road.
During the event, McAllister, who is Liverpool’s club ambassador, apologized for Slott’s absence and shared a short message from the 47-year-old, who was “very proud” to have won the honour. This happened as Slott oversaw Liverpool’s 3-0 win against Nottingham Forest on Saturday.
read more: Manager Jurgen Klopp has confirmed Arne Slott’s return to Liverpool as a candidate to succeed himread more: Liverpool star accused of ‘running away from criticism’ after Nottingham Forest nightmare
The Reds returned to Premier League action at Anfield hoping to turn around their dismal form ahead of the two-week international break. But what happened next was yet another misfortune for the Premier League-winning manager.
Murillo calmly gave the visitors the lead in the 33rd minute after a shot from the center of the box by Dan Ndoye appeared to obstruct the view of Alisson Becker, who was in an offside position, and was examined by VAR. However, after review, officials determined that Andoe was not in the shot-stopper’s line of sight, and the goal was allowed.
Premier League Match Center wrote in a statement to X: “The referee’s goal declaration was confirmed by VAR and it was determined that N’Doe was not in Alisson’s line of sight and did not act in a way that would affect the opponent.”
Igor Jesus then appeared to make the score 2-0, but his strike was ultimately canceled as a result of a handball seconds before burying the ball. It didn’t take long for Forest to double their lead.
Immediately after returning from the half-time break, Sean Dyche’s side had Nicolo Savona in the back of the net and Morgan Gibbs-White scored just 10 minutes after the full-time whistle. In his post-match press conference, Slott emphasized that Liverpool’s failure to take chances in the first half proved particularly costly in the end.
He said: “It’s hard to measure how bad it is, but of course it was a very bad result. To play at home and lose 3-0 against any team is of course a very, very, very bad result. If you look at the first 30 minutes of the game, it was unexpected.”
“In my opinion, I think we got off to a good start. I’ve probably never seen us create so much in the first 30 minutes of a game all season. I don’t know now because I don’t remember every game, but we were able to create a lot.”
“And the first time they arrived in our box, they scored a goal. It’s a very difficult cocktail to drink and drink. If you miss your chances, the ball will go in every time you concede.”
Asked if he believed he could pull Liverpool out of their current slump, he added: “That’s my responsibility. Win or lose, it’s my responsibility. But what I see is that the team and the fans will also stay until the end, support them until the end, and the players will continue to work until the end.”
“And what I saw today, it wasn’t[Manchester]City, but in City they weren’t the only team that struggled in the first half. But in the other games we’ve played, we’ve been the dominant team and we’ve been able to create chances. As I said, these days you almost always miss chances or concede goals, but that’s never going to last the whole season.”
“But we need that moment of energy to score a goal. If you play well and win 1-0, the other team is going to feel like, ‘Here we played 30 minutes and we’re losing 1-0, and we haven’t seen much of the ball.'” But the opposite happened, and scoring 1-0 gave them big, big, big energy.
“I’ve seen many situations where the outcome would have been different in ‘normal’ circumstances. But we’re in a difficult situation right now, and in those cases you have to work harder than you would have done to get a result.”
Following Saturday’s result, Liverpool are now 11th in the Premier League table, 11 points behind league leaders Arsenal. They have won just one of their last five games in England’s top flight.
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