The first obvious exception to the Reds’ general dominance is shooting accuracy; this won’t come as a surprise to many people reading this, as the stat that Liverpool have the worst shots-to-goals conversion ratio in the Premier League has been endlessly doing the rounds on Twitter and the forums of late (for a detailed analysis of Liverpool’s shot placement woes, check out this article which I wrote for the excellent The Tomkins Times website).
The other standout figure is in the tackling statistics. Most of that can surely be put down to the absence of one key player: Lucas Leiva. Of the eleven games where Liverpool attempted less tackles than their opponents, only two came in the twelve matches where Lucas played, meaning that in nine of the fourteen he has missed (or 64% of the time) the Reds were not as physical as the opposition.
So to make Liverpool a real force in the Premier League, is it as simple as bringing back the Brazilian maestro from injury and adding a clinical striker? Things are rarely that simple in football, but at the same time, if the Reds are dominating their opponents in the key aspects of matches for approximately 75% of the time, then I don’t think ​there can be too much wrong with the team and its approach.
To my mind, if Damien Comolli can find a deadly marksman and bring him on board, then suddenly this team might be able to take the league (or at least the top four) by storm next season. Over to you Damien.
