Jurgen Klopp has suggested that Liverpool may need to "reinvent themselves" in the wake of their horrific 4-1 defeat at the hands of Napoli on Wednesday night.
The Reds have made a lacklustre start to the season and midweek trip to Naples failed to spark an improvement in form. Liverpool were behind after five minutes courtesy of a Piotr Zielinski penalty and could have been two behind had Victor Osimhen not spurned another spot-kick just 10 minutes later.
Napoli did double their lead through Franck Zambo Anguissa before Giovanni Simeone made it three on the stroke of half-time. Zielinski netted his second of the night just 90 seconds after the restart to cap a miserable night for Liverpool, who bagged a consolation through Luis Diaz.
The chastening defeat leaves Liverpool with it all to do in Group A, with Ajax currently top of the pile after a thumping 4-0 win over Rangers. And Klopp pulled no punches in his damning post-match assessment of the defeat.
The Reds chief told BT Sport: "We played bad in the first half but usually we don't concede three goal. With Alisson in goal, you have to be really bad for that to happen. We played here when we lost 2-0 and that was an awful game.
"It looks like we have to reinvent ourselves. There is a lot of things lacking, the fun part is that we have to do it in the middle of a Premier League and Champions League season. We have Wolves on Saturday and if they saw the game tonight, they cannot stop laughing, they would say - and I would too - it is the perfect moment to play them. We have to set up better in pretty much everything.
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"Lots of soul searching, you could see that on the pitch. We are not working as a team, it is not personal stuff or pointing [at each other]. In football there are always solutions. We don't play good enough, that is obvious and that is why we lose games. We play in the strongest league in the world and have a pretty good Champions League group. There is a job to do, my responsibility and I need time to think about it. There are a few obvious things and we have to reset and go."
Liverpool were 3-0 down at the break, but Klopp admitted that his side were fortunate to not be further behind after Napoli spurned a host of golden chances to increase their lead.
He added: "3-0 down, having chances but [we were] never really in the game. We were not compact neither defensively or offensively. Until Thiago entered the pitch I can't remember one counter-pressing situation. The reason for that is we were much too wide. We tried to sort the situation ourselves with a little dribbling here or there, [but] we cannot really play together unconnected.
"So it was everything obvious. Why it happened, that's now the question. I cannot answer it now, give me a little bit of time to think about it. It's really a tough cookie to take, but obviously, I have to take it."
