Arne Slot, Manager of Liverpool, looks on during the Premier League match between Liverpool and Manchester United at Anfield on October 19, 2025 in Liverpool, England. (Photo by Michael Regan/Getty Images)placeholder image
Arne Slot, Manager of Liverpool, looks on during the Premier League match between Liverpool and Manchester United at Anfield on October 19, 2025 in Liverpool, England. (Photo by Michael Regan/Getty Images) | Getty Images
Liverpool suffered a fourth successive defeat in all competitions at the hands of Manchester United.
Arne Slot has delivered his theory on why Liverpool have conceded two late set-pieces goals to leave them trailing in the Premier League title race.
Liverpool shipped a 97th-minute goal from a throw-in to lose at Crystal Palace last month, while Harry Maguire netted headed home in the 84th minute for United. The centre-back’s intervention was engineered through the second phase of a corner.
Having trailed by a goal following Bryan Mbeumo breaking the deadlock after just 63 seconds, Slot made several attacking changes to his Reds team to find a way back into the game. It did work, with Cody Gakpo equalising on 78 minutes. Florian Wirtz, Hugo Ekitike, Federico Chiesa and Curtis Jones had all been introduced - and Slot believes that it may have left Liverpool vulnerable when it came to defending dead balls.
The Anfield head coach said: “Apart from the two goals we conceded, we have conceded maybe two or three more chances, but this is the struggle we are having being 1-0 down; then you need to take a bit more risk. And then I am even quite positive that we limit the opponent so much to the chances they are creating. Because we do take a lot of risk in the moment; after 55 minutes, I think we had six or seven offensive players on the pitch.
“That might also maybe not be an excuse but be the reason why the structure in defending a set-piece against [Crystal] Palace and now was not as perfect as we usually are, because normally you play with four, five, six defensive-minded players but at that moment we are on the pitch with seven or eight offensive-minded players. That's not an excuse because they should do better, we should do better, but maybe it's not a coincidence that exactly in those moments of time we concede a set-piece.”
Liverpool had chances from open play but failed to really threaten from their own set-pieces - something that Slot has demanded improvements. He added: “If you play United, with so many quality players they have - [and] brought in a few new ones this summer - and if they come to us in a low block, playing so many long balls, then the last thing you would want is going 1-0 down. Because that gives them even more belief. If you would have told me we are 1-0 down against a United team that played in the style they did, and you would have told me that we would create eight, nine, 10 open chances, then I would have said to you that I don't think that is possible. But it was possible.
“So, the second thing that went wrong is that from all the chances we got, we only scored one goal. I have said it in Holland many times and maybe I've said it here as well, it's almost impossible to win a big game of football - and Liverpool v United is a big game with so many quality players on the pitch - to win it with a negative set-piece balance. We conceded another one and that led to us losing the game.”
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