'What was he doing?' – Arne Slot gets wake-up call as Liverpool signing brutally slammed

Arne Slot has been warned Liverpool won’t retain the Premier League title if they keep repeating the defensive disaster class they put on against Newcastle . Sixteen-year-old Rio Ngumoha came off the bench to snatch a 3-2 victory deep into stoppage time as the Reds edged past 10-man Newcastle on an astonishing night at St James’ Park.

Fellow substitute Will Osula’s first goal of the season looked to have secured a remarkable point for the Magpies, who had Anthony Gordon sent off in first-half stoppage time and trailed 2-0 seconds after the break. However, Ngumoha’s intervention in the 10th minute of stoppage time ensured the visitors left with a stunning 3-2 win.

While Liverpool got out of jail, Slot won’t have been happy with his side’s below-par defending, which was evident in both of Newcastle’s goals. First, Bruno Guimaraes easily outjumped Milos Kerkez - a £40million summer signing from Bournemouth - to head home, before Osula latched onto a long free-kick from Nick Pope to bundle the ball home.

The nature of the goals has led to a scathing assessment from talkSPORT presenter Jeff Stelling and former Rangers striker Ally McCoist. Stelling declared: “They cannot win the league defending like that.

"[Ibrahima] Konate had another nightmarish game. Kerkez, what was he doing for the Bruno goal?” McCoist then waded in: “He doesn’t jump. Is he trying to shield him out the road?

"It’s a good header from Bruno, he does well, but I don’t know what he’s trying to do. The second, it’s just an old-fashioned long ball that they don’t deal with.”

Stelling added: “And the high line for that free-kick, it was crazy. Why have you got a line that was so high? It was asking for the flick-on and the player to run through, and that’s what they got.

“It was a great finish, to his credit, even if he’s been overshadowed by the headlines about the 16-year-old. But Asula finished that really well.”

Slot was delighted to emerge from a remarkable game with three points, but admitted his side had been lucky to get them. Asked about Ngumoha’s last-gasp winner, he said: “It’s of course special for him to score a goal in a moment like this.

“We know how it feels – last season, we conceded [at Newcastle] in the 89th minute, and now we were the lucky ones because that’s what we were. We were lucky to get a win over the line.

“This means more to me than when we play good football because tonight had, for me, nothing to do with tactics or good football. It was just a great game to watch, but not because of tactics or good football, but because every single second of the game, everybody was at the front of their seat.”

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