James Pearce has outlined one ‘crazy’ statistic from Liverpool’s season so far which might cause Jurgen Klopp some alarm.
The Reds’ tally of 47 goals in the Premier League this term is the fourth highest in the division, although they still find themselves sixth in the table and seven points off the top four, having won just four more games than they’ve lost.
Despite the goal haul looking impressive on first viewing, it has been heavily inflated by two results in particular, a fact which wasn’t lost on one journalist.
Pearce was discussing Liverpool’s need to be more ruthless in their final 12 games of the season in the Walk On podcast with some of his colleagues from The Athletic.
Sharing a link to the pod via his Twitter profile, he stated: “Crazy stat that #LFC have scored 34% of their PL goals across two games this season. Seven times they have failed to find the net. With plenty of options now up top, time for Klopp’s attack to fire consistently.”
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It’s indeed mind-blowing to think that 16 of Liverpool’s 47 goals (34%) in the current Premier League campaign have been scored in two of their 26 matches so far (7.7%).
The 9-0 thumping of Bournemouth last August and 7-0 rout of Manchester United earlier this month showcased the Reds at their brilliant, clinical best, but all too often those have been followed up by our attackers firing blanks.
Of the seven league games in which Klopp’s side have drawn a blank, five have been in the last nine top-flight matches, with Brighton, Chelsea, Wolves, Crystal Palace and (ironically) Bournemouth all easing to clean sheets against us.
The 1-0 loss at the Vitality Stadium seemed especially galling in the immediate wake of putting seven past Man United, with the frustration amplified by Mo Salah surprisingly missing a penalty against the Cherries that day.
There’s no question that Liverpool have attackers who can plunder goals at will – the Egyptian has scored 22 times for us this term, while Darwin Nunez and Bobby Firmino have 24 between them (Transfermarkt).
Cody Gakpo has four goals since his mid-season arrival at Anfield, adding to the 13 he netted for PSV Eindhoven earlier in the campaign (Transfermarkt).
Also, if Luis Diaz’s rate of four goals in his 12 matches prior to a six-month injury layoff had been maintained over the course of a full season, he’d surely have been well into the mid-teens by this stage.
Jose Mourinho might’ve been the scourge of Liverpool many times in the past, but there’s logic to his comment last year that ‘I prefer to lose one match 4-0 than four matches 1-0’ (as per Football Italia).
To misappropriate that somewhat, Klopp would surely rather see the Reds winning 1-0 in every match for the final two months of the campaign than continuing the trend of sporadic feasts partnering all too common famines.
You can see Pearce’s tweet below, via @JamesPearceLFC on Twitter:
Crazy stat that #LFC have scored 34% of their PL goals across two games this season. Seven times they have failed to find the net.
With plenty of options now up top, time for Klopp’s attack to fire consistently.
Latest episode of Walk On is out now…. https://t.co/hagoSYQLx0— James Pearce (@JamesPearceLFC) March 30, 2023