Liverpool’s dismal season continued last Saturday as they were embarrassed by Wolves.
The Reds succumbed to a 3-0 defeat at Molineux against a Wolves side battling relegation. It was the third English Premier League defeat in four matches for Jurgen Klopp’s team and leaves them in 10th, 11 points off a top four position.
To demonstrate the severity of their form, it was the first time Liverpool have lost three successive Premier League away matches since 2012.
After coming so close to a famous quadruple last season, what on earth has gone wrong for Liverpool? We caught up with Bet9ja Ambassador Victor Ikpeba to get his views.
VI: It’s difficult to understand why Liverpool are struggling so badly. They’ve won every trophy under Klopp so it gets to the stage where the players are unable to continue the same successes season to season.
It’s not been the same Virgil van Dijk who has struggled with injuries in recent times and is currently out, and of course is their strong point defensively. They lost Sadio Mane to Bayern Munich and offensively they have injuries with Diogo Jota, Roberto Firmino and Luis Diaz all out.
Even without the aforementioned injuries, there is so much quality in the rest of the squad that I’m not sure why Klopp hasn’t been able to get the best out of them. Last season Liverpool had a poor start but a great end to the season so Klopp is able to get the best out of his squad. Injuries have been a problem for Liverpool but I don’t have much sympathy for that when you consider the quality in depth that they have and I think they should be doing much better.
Sadio Mane factor
The likes of Diaz, Darwin Nunes and Cody Gakpo, who has just come in, haven’t been able to press the way Mane pressed. What was so special for that Liverpool side with Mane, Mo Salah and Firmino, was they formed a three up front and they pressed teams very well from the front, and with the players in the middle of the park and in defence.
I think they’ve lost that, which isn’t to say they can’t do it without Mane but they’ve lost what Mane brings to this team and haven’t been able to replace him. He scored 16 Premier League goals last season and 11 in 23 overall for Bayern this season, so has obviously been the key miss for Liverpool.
