Liverpool, champions of freestyle

Edin Terzic is an old friend of Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp. A German of Bosniak descent, Terzic is currently serving as an assistant coach to Lucien Favre at Borussia Dortmund. This is Terzic’s second stint with the Dortmund side. The last time he worked at the club, he served in multiple roles during a highly successful period under Klopp, where Dortmund won two league titles, one German Cup and reached the Champions League final once.

When Klopp was handed the reins of Liverpool following the sacking of Brendan Rodgrers in October, 2015, Terzic offered his insight into what fans could expect: “He loves to have like an organised chaos, if you know what I mean,” Terzic told the official website of West Ham, his employers at the time.

“What I mean is that there are rules in defence for organisation, but in the offence it is as fast as possible and scoring as many goals as possible, so for watching their games it is very good (sic).”

The term ‘organised chaos’ has since been in frequent use in Merseyside, although the ‘organised’ bit seemed to be missing at times in Klopp’s first two-and-a-half seasons. This season and the last, the phrase has bloomed into its full meaning, and blotted out all other teams in the process.

Opponents have found themselves struggling to adapt to Liverpool’s style of play, which has gradually become more fluid with time in Klopp’s reign. Stats from this season alone are staggering: with 13 games to go in the league, Liverpool have a 22-point lead over second-placed Manchester City, the biggest ever in the league’s history. The Reds have won 24 of their 25 games, drawing the remaining one.

As things stand, Klopp’s side, currently on 73 points after the best start in the league’s history, looks on course to break City’s record haul of 100 points in the 2017-18 season.

Having already lifted the UEFA Super Cup and the FIFA Club World Cup, Liverpool are also in the last 16 of the FA Cup and are arguably prime candidates to retain the Champions League title they won last season.

It will be a stunning turnaround from the time the German tactician took charge of the club over four years back, when Liverpool were languishing mid-table.

It is not an easy task understanding how Klopp has overseen this turnaround. Gradual changes to the team’s style of play, incredibly shrewd recruitment and having a core group of players as the team’s backbone in the last couple of years have seen the German produce a machine that is steamrolling opponents domestically and abroad.

All this, to speak nothing of the money. Klopp’s net spending at Liverpool has been a remarkably low figure of £74.5 million spread across nine transfer windows – an average of £8.28 million per window. For context, Pep Guardiola at City has accumulated a net spending of £475.01 million in eight windows for an average of £59.38 million every window.

FIRMINO’S IMPACT

While that underscores how well Liverpool have recruited during this period, one of the most important players during Klopp’s reign, perhaps the key to the team’s freeflowing attacks, is someone who had been hired by predecessor Rodgers. That player is Firmino, who serves as a brilliant case study of a striker who doesn’t score many goals but is the glue that holds the attack together.

A man-marker’s nightmare, Firmino’s rise to prominence is particularly down to his movement on and off the ball as well his positioning. From dropping down to a midfield pivot position, or to central or attacking midfield, Firmino’s flexible role in the Liverpool team serves many purposes.

The Brazilian is often dubbed as a false nine for playing much deeper than a traditional centre forward usually does. That term, however, isn’t a fair reflection of Firmino’s job profile. The 28-year-old moving to deep midfield roles helps improve the team’s ball retention and distribution.

It often goes unnoticed in games, but isn’t less important than what he does up front. Firmino draws opposition defenders or defensive midfielders forward by dropping down from the first line of attack, providing open spaces for Salah and Sadio Mane.

This ability to free up space in the final third, combined with his hold-up play, high work-rate, quick movement and a wide passing range, has helped Firmino turn Mane and Salah into a deadly duo up front. Mane being a more potent attacking threat in the last season-and-a-half can be partly attributed to the freedom he has received off the platform created by Firmino.

“He’s very important to Salah and to Mane because he drops back in between the lines to allow Salah and Mane to score as many goals,” Spurs boss Jose Mourinho had said of the forward when he was working as a pundit with Sky Sports earlier in the season.

“Firmino drops back and if he attracts a centre-back, it gives more space to the others. If he doesn’t, he’s free in between the lines to get the ball into play… He’s fantastic and I didn’t know the words, I love it now, you call it a ‘work horse’, I understand the meaning of it. He works so hard for the team.”

But it’s not just Firmino who makes Liverpool’s attack tick. Klopp’s unconventional use of his full-backs Trent Alexander-Arnold and Andy Robertson virtually in the wings has added another dimension to the way Liverpool play. The duo has been key to Klopp occasionally using a more direct route of football from the wings.

For any other team, this would have come at some cost to the team’s defensive organisation. Not at Liverpool, who have added significant flexibility to their style of play. Perhaps this is the secret sauce to their success; unlike most successful teams, you can’t pin down a single style of play on Liverpool. They can do everything, and do it well.

FLUID FOOTBALL

While Klopp’s ‘gegenpressing’, a high tempo pressing approach the team applies when not in possession, has remained a consistent theme since he joined the club, Liverpool have also been able to play a more patient style of football with higher ball possession. The addition of Fabinho from Monaco after the 2018 season has been key in this regard, with the Brazilian immediately improving the team’s ability to retain the ball and its build-up play.

Liverpool have maintained an average ball possession of over 60% in the league since the start of the 2018/19 season. Fabinho has also combined well with skipper Jordan Henderson to provide cover to the full-backs.

Dutchman Virgil van Dijk has arguably been the best signing of the Klopp era. Widely considered as the world’s best centre-back right now, Van Dijk has not only helped shore up the backline but also improved the build-up tempo from the back. A very simple metric to judge his impact on the team is comparing the goals conceded by the team over the last five seasons. In Klopp’s first three seasons, Liverpool conceded 50, 36 and 38 goals. Last season, that number came down to 22. With 13 games still left, it stands at 15 this season.

One player whose impact often slips under the radar is that of goalkeeper Alisson. Very few can match up to the former Roma custodian on current form. A key metric that can sum up his contribution is Liverpool’s ‘expected goals count’, for and against.

Widely used across the world by analysts as a reliable tool to measure quality of chances created, expected goals count for the Premier League top 2 this season reveal some interesting bits about both teams.

Liverpool’s expected goals count is 54.24, almost six goals below the 60 they have scored. This means that the Liverpool forwards have maintained a high level of finishing accuracy, and have turned half chances into goals more often than not.

The ‘expected goals against count’ for Liverpool is even more remarkable: 23.64, 8.64 more than the goals actually conceded—Alisson and his backline are clearing balls they have no business clearing.

In contrast, Man City’s counts are closer to their actual figures—expected goals is 67.53, with 65 actual goals being scored and that against is 25.29, where City have conceded 29 goals. Liverpool are simply scoring more and conceding less than they are expected to, while City are scoring slightly less and conceding more.

This also serves as a warning to Liverpool: maintaining the kind of results they have produced this season will not be as easy next term. At the same time, these results have shown that opposing teams are finding this Liverpool side less predictable to play against than the ones in Klopp’s first couple of seasons. Klopp had described his brand of football a few years back as ‘heavy metal football’. “I like heavy metal more. I always want it loud,” he had said.

The German has since evolved, and so has his game. As Liverpool walk towards their first league title in three decades, it would perhaps be apt to say that Klopp is making all kinds of great music.

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