Liverpool suffered a double dose of woe with the goal which gave Bournemouth the lead at the Vitality Stadium this evening.
The Reds had made a decent start in wet and windy conditions on the south coast, but the complexion of the game changed significantly in the 26th minute.
A long ball forward ought to have been cut out by Virgil van Dijk, but an inexplicably lackadaisical piece of defending from the LFC captain allowed Alex Scott to nip in ahead of him and cut the ball back to Evanilson, who gleefully hammered it into the visitors’ net to open the scoring.
Gomez injured in trying to prevent Evanilson goal
As if the concession of a farcical goal wasn’t bad enough, Alisson Becker inadvertently collided into Joe Gomez as they tried in vain to block the scorer’s shot, and the Liverpool defender stayed down amid the Bournemouth celebrations.
The 28-year-old looked groggy as he got back to his feet, and having being deemed not fit enough to continue, he was substituted shortly afterwards for Wataru Endo.
The Reds’ misery was compounded even further in the 33rd minute when Alex Jimenez beat the offside trap to fire past Alisson and double the Cherries’ lead.
Liverpool surely must strengthen at centre-back in January…?
The horrendous weather on the south coast may also be a reflection of Arne Slot’s mood after the costly first goal, and not just because it saw his team fall behind.
That the head coach felt compelled to bring on a midfielder in Endo to replace the stricken Gomez is a damning indictment of Liverpool’s lack of centre-back depth, even accounting for the temporary absence of Ibrahima Konate after the death of his father this week.
With reliable reports indicating that the Reds don’t intend to enter the transfer market this month unless the ‘right opportunity’ comes up, it runs the serious risk of Slot being left horribly short in a crucial area of the pitch.
Injuries aside, the Dutchman will also have been livid with how easily Evanilson’s goal was given up, with Van Dijk culpable of a schoolboy error in failing to deal with the initial danger.
The Liverpool captain did at least halve the deficit in first-half stoppage time, but the champions headed for the dressing room at the interval with some major issues to chew over after a damaging 45 minutes at the Vitality Stadium.
You can view Evanilson’s goal below, via @SkySports on X:
Evanilson slams home against Liverpool! 🎯 pic.twitter.com/imRGtGQOEc
— Sky Sports Premier League (@SkySportsPL) January 24, 2026
The weakest squad in the premier league top 6 and now down to 2 fit centre backs, with aspirations of Europe next season, winning the Champions League and FA Cup …..high hopes to say the least!
WE WILL NOT MAKE TOP 4 EVERY TIME WE SEEM TO BE TURNING A CORNER WE SLIP BACK.
we are absolutely dire we have needed a full back since Trent went have we replaced him NO.
Endo is not a full back Ramsey is though why did we not put Ramsey on.
with the only inform attacker on the bench for most of the game how do we expect to win.
With Gakpo and Salah playing like headless chickens both of them have forgoten where the net is.
Time for change before we Explode.
Slot should have no complaints. Let’s not talk about the 95th minute goal. Even if they did not score, we are going for another draw… Look here, Liverpool football club plays to win, not to avoid loss. The unbeaten run has done nothing to convince fans we are improving. The number of draws is disastrous and this 95th min loss is showing us reality. Slot really has no more ideas on how to stop the rot and bring us forward. How gakpo starts in place of Ekitike is baffling…