Jürgen Klopp has blamed the recent drop in performances from his Liverpool squad on a frustrating result against Manchester United. The Reds crashed out of the FA Cup in March thanks to the Red Devils, and were then held to a draw two weeks later when the two sides met in the Premier League.

In both matches Liverpool wasted a hatful of chances. In the 4-3 FA Cup defeat, the Reds had 25 attempts on goal before registering 28 in the league fixture. It is unclear which game Klopp was referring to but his side has not truly recovered since the dramatic FA Cup exit.

Liverpool was also dumped out of the Europa League by Serie A side Atalanta, and suffered a surprise loss to Crystal Palace at Anfield. The Merseyside derby defeat to Everton has seen Arsenal open a three-point gap at the top of the table, while Manchester City is in third with two games in hand.

Speaking after the 2-0 loss at Goodison Park on Wednesday evening, Klopp said. "You can see we are in a rush in front of the goal, you can see that. It’s long ago but I blame a little bit the [Manchester] United game for it; that many chances and you play really good but you don’t get anything for it.

"That’s really bad. Since then, we create but we don’t score often enough and that doesn’t help. It’s not like in a situation like that you don’t score and then just [think], ‘Ah, forget it, who cares?’ You cannot act like you scored 15 goals in the last two games or whatever.

“You can see that and that’s a problem. It’s always like this: you have to fight through these periods, it was never different. People asked me already about mentality. The mentality has different aspects. It’s not a problem of attitude.

"The boys want; nobody is doing anything like that on purpose. It’s my job to bring them into a situation that they feel confident to do it. With that part, I’m responsible for everything that happened tonight, so it’s not that I feel great. But that’s the most tricky part of football obviously, and in the moment it didn’t work out and now we have to keep trying."

Liverpool.com says: Both results at Old Trafford visibly took a toll on the Liverpool team. The FA Cup exit was a blow but failing to win in the league a few weeks later seriously hampered Liverpool's title hopes. The defeats to Crystal Palace and Everton mean a miracle is needed to finish top of the pile.