Benteke has single-handedly saved Liverpool from “doing a Chelsea”

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Benteke was a waste of money who has woefully underperformed all season, right?

Maybe, but depending on your viewpoint (and some well-placed stats) you could also argue that he’s the most important signing of last summer.

Allow us to explain.

Benteke has scored seven league goals this season (which, incidentally, is second only to Roberto Firmino (eight) in our leading scorers list). But take a look at who those goals have come against:

Liverpool 1-0 Bournemouth
Man Utd 3-1 Liverpool
Liverpool 1-1 Southampton
Chelsea 1-3 Liverpool
Liverpool 1-0 Leicester
Sunderland 0-1 Liverpool
Crystal Palace 1-2 Liverpool

Discounting the United and Chelsea games, it means Benteke’s big-game goals have been directly responsible for 13 points this season.

Subtract 13 points from our current haul of 44 and we’d be left with 31.

That’d put way down the league in 16th place and only seven points clear of the drop zone. Chelsea, meanwhile, would be nine points ahead of us.

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Clearly Benteke still has a lot of work to do if he wants to salvage his Liverpool career in the long term, but it’s probably fair to say that he doesn’t deserve as much criticism as he gets. Ultimately, no one else managed to score those goals, and we should be thankful to him for being able to.

Let us know what you think about the matter in the comments below.

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