Arne Slot's failure to solve giant problem laid bare in 3-0 Nottingham Forest loss – 'Minging'

Liverpool legend John Aldridge has slammed the Reds' defensive record as "absolutely minging" following their 3-0 defeat to Nottingham Forest on Saturday. The reigning Premier League champions have now suffered six losses in their last seven games across all competitions.

Arne Slot's team also fell to a 3-0 defeat against Manchester City prior to the November international break. This weekend's identical loss leaves them languishing in the lower half of the table.

Currently, Liverpool are sitting at 11th place in the Premier League and could find themselves trailing leaders Arsenal by 11 points if the Gunners triumph over Tottenham Hotspur on Sunday afternoon (4:30pm kick-off).

Now, Echo columnist Aldridge has taken to X ( Twitter ) to voice his concerns about Liverpool's ongoing crisis. The former Reds striker highlighted the number of goals conceded (20 in the league so far) as their biggest issue.

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He said: "It's become serious folks! Defensively, since we won the league last season, our goals against record is absolutely minging!

"I've said in my columns from early September we need 3 goals to win a game, and it's nearly December and it's still the same? We will always stay behind the team 100% but..." he added, followed by several exasperated emojis.

Aldridge then referenced the team's promising victories over Aston Villa and Real Madrid several weeks ago, which now seem to have been a false dawn for Slot's squad.

He added: "It's looking like the Villa and Real Madrid games were a false dawn, I'm lower than a pig's belly folks!!

"The last time I saw so many people leaving early at Anfield was when we beat Man U 7-0! ! That's how bad it was."

Liverpool captain Virgil van Dijk confessed after the match that their performance on the pitch has been subpar, acknowledging the serious issues in defence.

He said: "We concede too many easy goals. They scored obviously from a set piece again. You can ask if he was in front of Alisson, but it counted, so we're 1-0 down. We were not good in terms of battles, challenges, the fight, too rushed. It's a very difficult situation at the moment.

"There was nervousness after we conceded, but not before. We tried to rush things and that's human when you're in a difficult moment. We cleared the ones before and in the end, we'te in a very difficult moment. We don't get out of it by just speaking about it. It will take a lot of hard work.

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