LIVERPOOL boss Arne Slot has insisted his side “never go to the floor” as he questioned why officials didn’t rule out Manchester United’s opening goal after Alexis Mac Allister’s head injury.
The Reds suffered their fourth defeat in a row after being beaten 2-1 by their rivals at Anfield.
The team got off to the worse possible start after Bryan Mbeumo‘s opener before Cody Gakpo equalised late in the second half.
But Ruben Amorim‘s side left with all three points after Harry Maguire‘s late header to leave Liverpool trailing in the title race.
Slot has taken issue with United’s early goal through Mbeumo after play was not halted despite Mac Allister going down with a head injury in the build-up.
It came after the Argentine duelled with Virgil van Dijk in the build-up.
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And the Dutchman claimed that officials should have known that his side would never fake a head injury because they are “always a fair team”.
He said after the game: “I’ve said it many times and I’m hoping I’m not just saying this to you but everybody understands this.
“We are not a team – that I see a lot in football – that go to the floor pretending it’s a head injury so it kills the counter attack. That’s not who we are.
“We never go to the floor. We always are a fair team. So if a player is ever on the floor, you would hope that everybody would say, ‘Oh it’s Liverpool, they don’t do these sort of things, so let’s blow the whistle’.
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“Again that’s not an excuse for us conceding the goal and it’s not an excuse for us losing this game of football.”
During the game, commentator Peter Drury claimed referee Michael Oliver missed the incident and couldn’t halt proceedings.
He said: “The information we’re getting from the PGMOL is the referee didn’t see the injury, so therefore the referee couldn’t stop the game.”
But it was also suggested that it was Van Dijk who actually made contact with Mac Allister, which meant the incident wasn’t a foul and play could continue.
Mac Allister managed to play on but wore a skullcap for the rest of his time on the pitch, before being subbed off in the 62nd minute.
Slot later aimed a dig at United’s style of play, admitting it was hard for Liverpool to play against a team that “defends in a low block” and “plays long balls”.
He said: “It’s always difficult to defend against a team that defends in a low block, that mainly plays long balls.
“But it makes it even more difficult when you go 1-0 down after one minute when a player of ours is on the floor.
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“If you would have told me before the game that against the low block, against the team that plays so many long balls, we would have created as many chances as we did, I would not have expected us to lose this game of football.”
Liverpool have an immediate chance to bounce back as they prepare to travel to Eintracht Frankfurt in the Champions League before a trip to Brentford next week.
