Liverpool have begun the season in stuttering form and manager Jurgen Klopp will not be happy with one statistic that reveals the reason behind their struggles.
The Reds have struggled early on with an uncharacteristically slow start to the season which sees them languishing in seventh place – five points off their rivals Manchester City.
With changes on and off the pitch to contend with, as well as injuries and freak incidents, it’s certainly not been the ideal start to the new season.
Now a statistic has been revealed that claims that Liverpool have been out-run by every PL team they’ve faced this season.
Another big week ahead 💪 pic.twitter.com/5YK0pySv2D
— Liverpool FC (@LFC) September 4, 2022
Liverpool out-worked? Surely not…
The Reds have been one of the most intense teams during the Klopp-era at Liverpool, with their high-pressing and high-energy, fluid 4-3-3 formation bringing them all sorts of success on the pitch.
However, beginning this season, there was a sense of a new beginning with Luis Diaz starting his first full season, Darwin Nunez’s arrival and the departure of club legend Sadio Mane.
On the eye test alone you can see in certain games (Manchester United away) where they’ve been outworked and where the other team has just ‘wanted it more’ which in Klopp’s eyes is unacceptable.
Take United for example; Erik ten Hag wanted to make Manchester United players run 13.8 kilometres (8.5 miles) during their exercises in their extra training session following their 4-0 loss to Brentford players. He made them make up the extra distance on their rest day to prove a point to his players. Since then, it’s four wins out of four.
Liverpool have been out run in every single match this season.[@DanKennett]
— Anfield Edition (@AnfieldEdition) September 3, 2022
Personally, the fact they’ve been outrun is down to a few reasons. A simple one is the sheer weight of expectations and pressures combined with the club playing every single game available to them last season will certainly have taken some sort of edge out of this squad.
Also, the loss of someone like Mane, coupled with new additions was always going to need a bedding-in phase, even if they are all top players, things like this need some time to settle.
The absence of key players, especially in midfield, has seen fringe midfielders get more minutes at the start of this season and its resulted in a lower level of performance as a whole.
For Klopp, he knows when they get all of their key men back, then they’ll be able to re-discover those absurdly high levels which we’ve been so accustomed to seeing over the last four years.
