On sticking together as a team…
The most important thing is we stick together no matter what happens, but we also demand more from each other because we need to perform together as a team. That’s what the club deserves, what the fans deserve and that’s what we are fighting for together. We are just being honest with each other that some things really have to improve to get back to that.
On blocking out external talk about Liverpool’s form…
It can be difficult. Obviously, if you don’t want to read anything or get anything into your head, it’s almost not possible at these times with social media and whatever is going on online. Like I said before, if we are together inside of the dressing room, I think this is the most important [thing]. We can get confidence out of each other. We know we have to do better and if we stick together, that will be the end result: that we do better.
On players’ self-confidence and Arne Slot saying he ‘takes responsibility’ for Liverpool’s form…
I think every player, if you win a lot of matches and everything goes well, everything is going your way, you always feel better than when you lose matches and it doesn’t go your way. I think we know how good we are, we’ve let that be seen this season and definitely last season, so I don’t think you can lay the blame there [self-confidence]. We just have to do much better. We know that and we try every day to work at that. The boss takes responsibility for that, but we as players also have a big responsibility to ourselves, to the manager, to the club and to the fans. Like I said, we know what we can do, we’ve let it be seen before, but at this moment we are not doing that and we want to get back to that level. I definitely take responsibility for it.
On building relationships with the new signings that have come into the squad…
Obviously new players came in. I think every time when a new player comes in, it is a little bit of adaptation or adjustment for everybody surrounding the player, because we don’t know how he moves, how he passes, when he passes, how he runs, how fast he runs. So, I think that’s a process. I think it is going well but maybe it doesn’t help if we don’t really win the games. I think if we would win every game, there would still be some improvements [needed] in the relationships but nobody would speak about it. But now, because we don’t win the games, this can be a topic. We are working on that also in training, we speak with each other, we try to develop that relationship to really get to know each other. It has to come to a result that we are really going to find each other in the games and score out of these situations, or help each other.