Alan Shearer has taken aim at Liverpool's players following their Premier League defeat to Brighton. The Reds recorded a 10th league defeat of the season as Danny Welbeck scored a brace, meaning Milos Kerkez's goal counted for little.
Former Newcastle and England forward Shearer was scathing in his criticism of Arne Slot's side as he identified issues all across the pitch. The Match of the Day pundit noted that Liverpool had no threat up front after Hugo Ekitike's early exit due to injury.
Shearer conceded that caused problems, as did Slot's need to cycle through full-backs. But the 55-year-old believes Slot's team lacked intensity and had issues with their positioning across the pitch.
“There’s no doubt that the situation with Ekitike upset them in terms of the rhythm and they had to change a few bits," Shearer said. “But there were three different right-backs today, clearly that doesn’t help.
"But there was no pressure in midfield, no threat up front and defensively the spaces in between were glaring, it was so obvious what was missing."
The Premier League's top goalscorer suggested that Liverpool were bullied by the Seagulls at the Amex and claimed that Virgil van Dijk and Ibrahima Konate were 'a mess'. Shearer was wholly unimpressed.
“I thought they were outfought and they were bullied by Brighton, particularly defensively,” he said. “They went into it again with no width and when Wirtz got the ball he had no options to his right or left, he had to go straight down the middle. There was nothing really available for him.”
“Welbeck bullied the two centre-backs, they were all over the place,” he said. “I thought they were really poor and all over the place, they really were, they were a mess.”
Slot did not want to offer excuses after the defeat on the south coast but was frustrated by his team's lack of creativity. He did appear to suggest Brighton had strength on their bench, however.
"I have a clear opinion what that's down to but that's not what I'm going to say over here," Slot said when asked about his side's creative struggles.
"As I said, they were the better team and created more chances than us. Everything I say about this people will see this as excuses and I never like to use excuses after the game.
"Give credit to them. They were good. I think it was nice for their manager that he was able to bring [Kaoru] Mitoma in because he was quite good again."
