Theo Walcott was left shellshocked upon learning of a damning statistic which goes a long way to explaining why Liverpool have faltered in recent games.
Having scored 24 goals in their seven Premier League fixtures in January and February, averaging 3.42 per game, the six top-flight matches they’ve played since then have seen then net only nine times, with their average dropping to 1.5 per 90 minutes.
On Monday night’s edition of Premier League Productions (15 April, 23:10), Steve Bower drew attention to a statistic which showed that Jurgen Klopp’s side have the third-worst shot conversion rate in the division since the beginning of March with a paltry 6%, superior only to Brighton (3.4%) and Everton (5.3%).
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Upon hearing that fact, Walcott reacted: “We are talking about Liverpool Football Club. Players who have graced the field like Michael Owen and Jari Litmanen, who was a fantastic finisher back in the day. That’s how old I am as well!
“It’s not a good stat for Liverpool to have…they have players who can score goals, but when it doesn’t happen, they need to be a bit more focused on those situations and actually really start to put people to the sword here. They are going for the title. They need to up those stats, that’s for sure.”
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A closer look at Liverpool’s six Premier League matches (via FBref) exposes some uncomfortable truths:
- Nottingham Forest (A): 22 shots, 1 goal
- Manchester City (H): 18 shots, 1 goal
- Brighton (H): 30 shots, 2 goals
- Sheffield United (H): 29 shots, 3 goals
- Manchester United (A): 27 shots, 2 goals
- Crystal Palace (H): 21 shots, 0 goals
In those half-dozen games, Liverpool have scored nine times from 147 shots, with a match average of 1.5 goals from 24.5 attempts. To put another way, it takes us 16 shots to score one goal since the beginning of March.
Incredibly, one of the above matches that we won (away to Forest) witnessed the Reds recording just one shot on target all afternoon, namely the 99th-minute winner from Darwin Nunez.
Scoring from the only effort on target is the definition of clinical, but one shot on goal out of 22 (4.5%) is embarrassing from a team with aspirations of winning the Premier League.
Liverpool quickly need to get back to the efficiency that they showed during the winter, when over two games against Bournemouth and Brentford they scored eight times from 29 shots in total (FBref). What we wouldn’t give for such a level of ruthlessness over the six remaining top-flight games this season.