Andoni Iraola was left to rue a poor start as Liverpool were beaten 1-0 at Anfield by defending Premier League champions Arsenal

Andoni Iraola was left to rue a slow start to the game as Liverpool were beaten 1-0 by defending Premier League champions Arsenal at Anfield.

The Gunners scored the only goal of the game after 16 minutes when they pounced on a poor pass out from the back by Alisson Becker before Declan Rice crossed low for Kai Havertz to tap in.

Liverpool's response was impressive but they failed to capitalise on their dominance as Mikel Arteta's men held firm and Iraola was frustrated by the manner of the defeat.

"Overall, I think we have to blame the start of the game especially," said the Reds head coach. "Until we conceded the goal, I think the start hasn't been at the level of the game.

"But from that 1-0, I think it's 15 or 16 minutes, I've loved the reaction of the team. I've loved even in the first half, I think we reacted really well, and I think we put Arsenal under big pressure.

"I think we've done enough to score, but obviously we haven't. But we had, for me, the crossbar, we had the header of (Alexis) Mac Allister that for me is a very clear chance.

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"I think we had a clear penalty also for us and I think we've had a lot of situations inside the box, not even around the box, inside the box, that definitely we haven't finished properly.

"I think since we've conceded the goal until half-time, I think we've had very good moments. (We had) a very good 30 minutes. We were, it looked, quite close.

"The goal, we’ve put them under pressure, we've put them inside the box, we put them there, but we haven't had the clarity to finish better the situations.

"I decided to finish (the game) with Rio Ngumoha, with Victor Munoz and put in Dominik Szoboszlai to see if we could maybe from one shot outside the box, to score in different ways.

"We've had a lot of set-pieces but we haven't been able to score from there and also they've been very good defensively in the second half."

Iraola felt his team were denied a clear penalty when Alexander Isak was dragged back by Jurrien Timber when attempting to reach a Bradley Barcola cross in the first half.

He added: "I can say what I think about the situations, but we cannot waste too much time (talking) about the refereeing decisions, I think. We have to say what it is, I think it's a pen, but we have to control the things that we need to improve to be on the right side of these close games.

"I think we’ve done today more than enough to score. Probably what we need to correct is the beginning of the game until we concede.

"It's true that we concede when we mess up a goal kick, but the feeling I had before is their goal was closer than ours. And from that moment, I think the game also has changed to our favour.

"It's true that probably they don't need to take risk and they go also deeper, but I honestly felt our goal was coming because I think we've created enough pressure."