By Ali Gokcek
After thrashing Crystal Palace 7-0, Liverpool sat at the top of the league one point ahead Manchester City. However, this was all the way back on December 19th of 2020. Since then, Liverpool have been in a seemingly endless slide in the performance and standings. Today they sit on the 6th spot 25 points behind the 1st place Manchester City. There have been a few reasons for this major dip.
Firstly, Liverpool’s defense has taken several major hits with injuries to Van Dijk, Gomez, Joel Matip, and Fabinho. In October Van Dijk sustained a nasty torn ACL by Everton’s goalkeeper, Jordan Pickford. Additionally, Gomez suffered a knee injury back in November. Moreover, Joel Matip suffered a ligament injury in February. Fabinho’s season has also been riddled with injuries. All of these players had huge roles on the defensive side in Liverpool’s title runs during the past couple of years. When all of these players get injured with a couple of weeks in between, it was bound to cause a disaster.
However, these injuries have not been Liverpool’s biggest problem. Many of their losses have been 1-0 defeats to sub-par teams such as Fulham, Brighton, and more. This signals that the offense has not been able to keep up. Allowing one goal is not that bad, however, if a team cannot answer that deficit with 2-3 goals, then there is a problem. Salah, Mane, and Firmino have only been able to score 10 goals in the past 15 Premier League matches; meanwhile allowing 17 goals. Liverpool’s playmaking and goal scoring capabilities have simply not been up to the standard that a title contender should be up to.
Fortunately, Liverpool has won the last game against the Wolverhampton Wolves, hopefully signifying a comeback into the top three by Liverpool. With the upcoming stretch of games against top teams, Liverpool needs to be at their best.
