Alan Shearer says two Liverpool players were 'bullied' at Brighton in damning verdict

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Liverpool was beaten 3-1 by Brighton at the Amex Stadium on Saturday and Alan Shearer was scathing in his criticism of Arne Slot's side on Match of the Day

Alan Shearer was not impressed by Liverpool(Image: Match of the Day)

Alan Shearer has delivered a damning verdict on Liverpool's performance following its Premier League loss to Brighton. The Merseysiders suffered their 10th league defeat of the campaign as Danny Welbeck netted twice, rendering Milos Kerkez's strike meaningless.

The former Newcastle and England striker pulled no punches in his assessment of Arne Slot's outfit, highlighting deficiencies throughout the team. Speaking on Match of the Day, Shearer observed that Liverpool lacked any attacking threat following Hugo Ekitike's early withdrawal through injury.

The 55-year-old acknowledged this created difficulties, as did Slot's requirement to rotate full-backs. However, Shearer maintained that Slot's side were lacking in energy and struggled with their shape all over the park, reports the Liverpool Echo.

"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 remarked. "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 all-time leading marksman argued that Liverpool was overpowered by the Seagulls at the Amex and described Virgil van Dijk and Ibrahima Konate as 'a mess'. Shearer was thoroughly unimpressed.

Liverpool captain Virgil van Dijk.(Image: Liverpool FC via Getty Images)

"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 [Florian] 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 declined to make excuses following the loss on the south coast but expressed disappointment with his side's shortage of creativity. He did seem to acknowledge Brighton possessed quality options from the substitutes' bench, though.

"I have a clear opinion what that's down to but that's not what I'm going to say over here," Slot remarked when questioned about his team's creative deficiencies.

"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."