Virgil van Dijk said Arne Slot was angry with his Liverpool team after their 2-1 defeat to the Premier League’s bottom club Wolves and said the head coach had every right to be annoyed with his players.
Liverpool were beaten by a 94th-minute goal from Wolves midfielder Andre but Van Dijk was critical of their performance from the start, which he said was “very poor”.
Liverpool, who had won their four previous games, missed the chance to go third and Van Dijk said that if they do not qualify for the Champions League, they will not merit a place in the European elite next season.
“Either we get it and we deserve it or we don’t get it and we don’t deserve it,” said the defender.
Van Dijk revealed Slot was furious and understood why, adding: “He was angry. Of course. He had every right because we played poorly.
“That was already the case in the first half. Second half maybe there was more urgency but it still wasn’t good enough. He had every right to be angry.
“Based on our performance up until they scored their first goal, we deserved to go 1-0 behind. We were very poor. We were too slow and predictable in possession.
“We made the wrong decisions. We didn’t concede any big chances up to that point. Defensively, we were still solid.
“But towards the end, when the game started to open up, any team can become dangerous and that’s what happened.
“The opening goal came from a long ball that we lost up high. It was a big space to defend. There was still plenty of time to turn it around.
“We scored the equaliser but then it became very chaotic. We went back to making the wrong decisions when we had the ball.
“The spaces became massive. To then concede again with a massive deflection is very disappointing.”
Liverpool face Wolves again later this week in the FA Cup and Van Dijk added: “We have to pretty quickly turn this into full focus on Friday. That’s our responsibility physically and mentally.”
