LIVERPOOL’S DEFENCE: WHAT HAS REALLY IMPROVED?

Are we to call it a crisis yet? Can Liverpool's defensive concerns be resolved? Will they concede much goals like they conceded last season? These are all the questions throbbing our precious minds right now.

No one can say that Liverpool Football Club has not improved under current manager Jurgen Klopp. In his first full season in charge they finished 4^th in the English Premier league. That was last season. Finishing fourth last season meant that they have now finished in the top four twice in eight years. The other time being their second place finish under Brendan Rogers in the 2013/2014 season.

Under Klopp’s tutelage, Liverpool players have improved, with the notable improvement being Adam Llalana, who now plays a key role in the Liverpool team. Epitomizing the manager’s philosophy of gengen pressing.

The team on their day exhibits their manager’s off the pitch energy and enthusiasm, harrying and hassling opponents, transitioning with pace and catching their opponents off-guard in their counter-pressing. With the pace and trickery of their forward three and the way the team is set up, Liverpool can outscore any opponent.

With all this attacking fluidity and gengen pressing, the team still struggles with a familiar foe – their defending

Post Benitez era, Liverpool have not been known to be a defensive team. All managers after then have been tasked to make Liverpool play attractive football. Which when judged by what attacking football is all about, only Brendan Rogers and Jurgen Klopp have lived up to. But with too much attention on the attacking side of the game, possibilities remain that the defensive side of the game will suffer. This is the case of Liverpool. Scoring loads of goals and yet conceding loads of goals too. For a club with title ambitions (that’s what really they should be aiming for), that won’t do.

From the appointment of Brendan Rogers in the 2012/2013 season till date (i.e. including the 10 premier league games so far this season), Liverpool have scored 382 goals and conceded 249. After the abysmal end of Brendan Rogers, the appointment of Jurgen Klopp was supposed to herald a new era.

In Klopp’s 57 games in the Premier League as Liverpool’s manager, they have shipped in 74 goals. In that same period they have scored a whopping 113 goals. In their 10 Premier league games this season, Liverpool have allowed 38 shots on target, conceding 16 in the process. The worst in the top six. Two Liverpool players have made errors that led directly to a goal so far this season.

The season is still young and much can still be achieved. Football neutrals will always enjoy Liverpool games because of its goal potentials, but Liverpool should never always expect to outscore all their opponents. Defensive solidity may be the difference between a title challenge and a top four finish.