What Eddie Howe said on Liverpool defeat, transfers and injuries last night

Questions will be asked as we failed to capitalise on our impressive performance against PSG, falling to a 4-1 defeat against Liverpool in the Premier League last night.

Anthony Gordon grabbed his long-awaited open play goal with a superb finish in the first half, before a rapid fire brace from Hugo Ekitike put us 2-1 behind before half time.

And from there it seemed all too routine for the reigning Champions, as Florian Wirtz grabbed their third and Ibrahima Konate their fourth as we continued our torrid record at Anfield.

Here’s what Howe had to say after a humbling night under the lights:

https://youtu.be/SR5RW6DbrK8?si=dlBwEF4q7KAoX0fB

On the performance

Last night’s result leaves us six points off the top four, but despite this setback, Howe has urged the players and the fans to not dwell too much on the final scoreline and reflect more on the mostly-positive performance that we put in.

“That’s a really tough scoreline for us. I thought it was a decent performance, and I don’t say that often if we’re losing by three goals.

“I thought we were strong, really good start to the game, thought territory was good, idea was good, attitude from the players was really good, execution was there.

”I just think the thing that’s cost us today is the manner of the goals we conceded, we’re disappointed with that. We wouldn’t normally, by our very high standards, concede those type of goals. I’ve got to give credit to Liverpool, but we’re kicking ourselves really with goals 1 and 2.”

“I think that just sort of summed up the way things went for us. Really disappointed with the first goal, because that of course changes the game massively. We don’t make a couple of good decisions, and we get punished.

“That’s what happens here, if you do anything  wrong they’ve got the quality to expose you, from a position of dominance, we find ourselves behind.

“(A good performance) can’t get lost from our view, because that’ll damage our confidence if we do.”

On ongoing away form issues

Anfield is a stadium where we haven’t won since 1994, and having seen all three promoted sides get draws here in recent months, it shouldn’t have been too far out of our reach to get at least a point as well.

But instead our terrible away form continued, and fans should rightfully feel irate that we let a great opportunity slip to get a result over the defending champions.

“It has been a problem for us all season, there is no getting away from that fact. Ideally today we would have played a little differently but we were really hamstrung with injuries so we went the way that we did and I was pleased with the attitude of the players. We saw some really positive signs that can help us in the future.

“We have to keep looking for solutions. We are in a tough run with a lot of away fixtures so we are going to be really finely tuned and hope we can solve our away form and in the next games we can come up with the solutions to take us forward.”

On Botman and Miley

Two notable absentees from tonight’s starting XI were Sven Botman and Lewis Miley - surprise omissions having each been excellent these past few weeks.

But with some crucial games in the Carabao Cup, FA Cup and Champions League, it seems like Howe didn’t want to take any precautions with starting either man.

“Sven had a tight thigh and we were under the advice not to use them. With Lewis he could not bend his knee to declare himself fit.”

On potential transfer activity

Even with £120m+ worth of attackers on the bench, Saturday’s game exposed the lack of real game changers Howe has at his disposal, and the team’s drive pales in comparison to what it shows when both Bruno Guimaraes and Joelinton are available.

And Howe’s latest comments hint that any new game changer, or fresh face altogether, won’t be coming in at all before deadline day next week.

When asked about the possibility of making a new signing by the end of the window, Howe simply commented “No.”

The gaffer didn’t rule out that other changes could be coming to the defence however: he added that Jamaal Lascelles could very much go in the next few days as Championship Club eye up his signature, meanwhile loanee Matt Targett could still be recalled from Middlesbrough amidst the fullback injury crisis.