Premier League Round 17: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

The Ugly

Honeymoon over?

Jurgen Klopp’s first match in charge of Liverpool was a scoreless draw with Tottenham on 17 October. They drew 1-1 with Rubin Kazan in the Europa League before drawing 1-1 at home against Southampton in the Premier League.

In the Capital One Cup Liverpool picked up their first victory under Klopp 1-0 against Bournemouth. Since that win against Bournemouth things have been a bit unpredictable for Liverpool.

They went to Stamford Bridge and beat Chelsea 3-1 and a lot of people thought this would be the launching point to great things for the Reds. They beat Rubin Kazan in the Europa League after that, but then ran into their arch-nemesis in Crystal Palace, who beat them 2-1 at Anfield.

That result could send Liverpool into a tailspin, right?

Wrong.

They beat Manchester City 4-1 away. They claimed another Europa League victory, this time against Bordeaux, before beating Swansea City 1-0.

Liverpool then took on Southampton in the Capital One Cup and handed them a 6-1 thrashing away. Liverpool are flying high at this point and look like they might go on an extended run of wins to crawl back into the race for top four, right?

Wrong.

The Reds traveled to St. James’ Park and took a surprising 2-0 defeat against Newcastle. That result has had a disastrous impact on their confidence, evidently, as they have yet to win since.

They played out a scoreless draw with Scion in the Europa League before drawing 2-2 at home against West Brom.

As if the draw with West Brom at Anfield was not bad enough, the Reds were dismantled 3-0 by Watford this round. The Reds also lost Martin Skrtel for six weeks as the hits keep on coming.

Liverpool are 3-3-3 since Klopp took over for Brendan Rodgers. They are ninth in the table, just one spot ahead of Everton, and five points behind Tottenham for fourth place. With the way the Reds are playing, that gap will only grow wider.

Liverpool have problems, chief among them being that their squad is not very good. Daniel Sturridge, one of their very best players, is constantly injured. Simon Mignolet is a decent goalkeeper, but when he was out injured Adam Bogdan made a critical mistake during his time in goal.

According to whoscored.com, only four Liverpool players are averaging a 7.0 match rating or better in the Premier League this season.

Philippe Coutinho, Liverpool’s best player, is just 23-years old and averaging a 7.28 match rating this season. If he continues to play well then the links to bigger clubs will not stop, and Coutinho will eventually leave if Liverpool do not start consistently qualifying for the Champions League.

None of Liverpool’s defenders are averaging a 7.0 match rating. Martin Skrtel, who is averaging a 6.97 this season, is set to miss six weeks due to injury. Dejan Lovren, averaging a 6.99, is set to return from injury but has not played as well as he did for Southampton since joining the Reds.

Most of the young players bought by Rodgers over the last few seasons are struggling to adapt to Liverpool. Alberto Moreno is averaging a 6.93, Christian Benteke is at 6.89, Nathaniel Clyne, Roberto Firmino and Emre Can are all 6.76 or below.

Divock Origi, Jordon Ibe and Danny Ings are all playing poorly.

Klopp has a lot of work to do to turn this squad around. He is capable of doing so, but it is going to take some time because the current squad is not good enough to qualify for the top four.

Klopp had a lot of success at Borussia Dortmund by finding players in the transfer market who went under the radar, but turned out to be extremely good players.

Robert Lewandowski was playing for Lech Poznan in his native Poland when Dortmund’s scouting department found him. They paid a miniscule 4.5 million euros for a player who is now regarded as one of the top strikers on the planet.

Ilkay Gundogan cost Dortmund 4 million euros when they signed him from Nurnberg. Mats Hummels cost Dortmund 4 million euros when he signed from Bayern Munich’s academy. Dortmund found Shinji Kagawa playing for Cerezo Osaka in Japan and bought him for 350,000 euros.

That is how you build a club into a side capable of going toe-to-toe with Bayern Munich in the UEFA Champions League Final.

Liverpool need to ramp up their scouting abilities and find those hidden gems that can grow into star players because the chances of them buying a ready-made star for big money are slim-to-none.

Until Klopp can build the team he wants then Liverpool fans will have to be patient and sit through more bad stretches like the one they are in right now.