Solly March scored twice and Danny Welbeck added a third as Liverpool slumped to a woeful defeat against Brighton at the Amex Stadium.
Liverpool’s dire season took another turn for the worse as Solly March’s double helped Brighton and Hove Albion to a superb 3-0 Premier League win on Saturday.
March, who saw a penalty award overturned by VAR in the first half, scored twice in the opening eight minutes of the second half to put the game out of Liverpool’s reach.
Substitute Danny Welbeck added a glorious third late on to put the seal on a sixth top-flight defeat of the season on Jurgen Klopp’s beleaguered Reds.
The result helped the Seagulls move above Liverpool into seventh, with the eighth-placed Reds staying seven points adrift of the Champions League qualification places.
Brighton were comfortably the better side in the opening 30 minutes, yet despite a number of promising opportunities, they were unable to beat Alisson.
The Liverpool goalkeeper breathed a huge sigh of relief shortly before half-time when a penalty awarded against him for a foul on March was overturned after the Brighton midfielder ventured marginally offside in the build-up.
March was not to be denied a minute into the second half when he met Kaoru Mitoma’s prodded ball across the face of goal with a simple finish past Alisson.
It got even better for Brighton and March seven minutes later when the 28-year-old latched onto Evan Ferguson’s pass, took the ball away from his marker and clipped a fine left-footed finish across Alisson from 15 yards.
Liverpool’s misery deepened nine minutes from full-time when former Manchester United forward Welbeck lifted the ball over Joe Gomez’s head and clipped past Alisson for a fine third.
Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp admitted his concern for the club’s current state after losing 3-0 to Brighton on Saturday.
The Reds’ miserable season continued at the AMEX and they have slipped to eighth in the Premier League table, dropping below the Seagulls in the standings.
With the prospect of qualifying for next season’s Champions League slipping away, Klopp revealed post-match he is worried about Liverpool’s regression this season as this was possibly the worst result of his career.
“Yeah, how can you not be after a game like this?” Klopp said when asked if he was concerned about the situation. “I cannot stand here and say it didn’t happen. Of course, we have to be very concerned about it.
“Bad. Really bad. I can’t remember a worse game. A really tough day. It’s not difficult maybe. Brighton were the better team, it was well deserved. They played really well. It was a very organised team against a not very organised team. We gave the ball away, the spaces were too big and we couldn’t push up.
“That is obviously not good, especially against a super well-drilled side like Brighton. They got more confident and we did the opposite. I can imagine they are very happy because it was a great performance and we made it too easy in too many moments.”
