Steven Gerrard has expressed his disbelief at Liverpool’s 3-0 opening day loss to West Brom, admitting that he had expected his side to dominate the game.

With Luis Suarez failing to impress at one end of the pitch, Zoltan Gera, Peter Odemwingie and debutant Romelu Lukaku all netted to condemn the Reds to their biggest defeat in the first game of a new season since 1937.

Daniel Agger was also given his marching orders to compound a sense of “total shock” among the Liverpool squad, Gerrard revealed.

“The feeling after was one of total shock with the result. It was never a 3-0 game,” the Reds captain told the Liverpool Echo.

“I fancied us to go there, dominate and win but things didn’t work out that way. In football you can be left feeling hard done by.

“It took us five minutes to settle down but after that we controlled the game until they scored against the run of play just before half-time. In the second half quite a few things didn’t go our way at big times.”

The Merseyside outfit now face an immediate distraction from the Premier League in the shape of an away trip to Scottish side Hearts in the Europa League on Thursday evening.

Gerrard acknowledged that the loss against the Baggies was not an ideal way to kick the season off and is taking responsibly for the result while vowing to get back on track against John McGlynn’s men.

“It’s not the start we wanted but it’s no time for panic,” he added. “It’s only the first game and it was one bad day at the office.

“We’ve got to look at the bigger picture. There’s been so much hope around the place and rightly so.

“After a 3-0 defeat everyone is going to be concerned. It’s important that the likes of myself and the other experienced players take responsibility for a poor defeat.

“We have to put it behind us. We’ve got to dust ourselves down and bounce back against Hearts on Thursday night.

“We have to react in the right manner and look to put things right in the coming games.”