Skrtel or Sakho? Who is better to partner Lovren?

Despite being far apart on the ethnic field, Martin Skrtel and Mamadou Sakho play an eerily similar style of football on the pitch.  The Slovakian and the Senegalese-Frenchman are both efficient passers, each posting around 90% last season and this campaign so far, neither are very committal to tackling, preferring to play a 'stand-offish', marking style of defense, and both like to get forward, though Sakho does this much more to my liking.  If I had to give an edge to either concerning attacking and/or defending, I'd say Skrtel is actually better on both sides of the ball despite Sakho being more 'creative'.

That is not the question though, it is whom is better to partner our Croatian juggernaut, Dejan Lovren.  To do that, let's take a look at Lovren's style of play.  Our Number Six is not as good a passer as his fellow centre backs, but has improved from last season when he played for Southampton.  So far he's posted an 88.5% pass completion percentage compared to 82% last year, which is even more impressive when you consider he's averaged 17 more pass attempts per a match this season so far.  That probably has more to do with the fact that the Saints averaged nearly 2 more yards per pass and attempted 14 more long balls per match, finishing second in the league with 70 attempts on average. Lovren is also more likely to 'go to ground' and attempt a tackle than Skrtel or Sakho.  He has completed 11 successful tackles this season so far while the other two have 3 combined.

One could argue match-ups should play a part, but there are two great examples from this season that make that argument invalid.  Skrtel paired Lovren at the Etihad which Liverpool lost 3-1 despite playing well.  Unfortunately, City played slightly better even though two of their goals were due to defensive mishap, none the fault of Skrtel though.  In fact, I re-watched an extended highlights video of that match and noticed a lot of friction and distrust displayed between Lovren and Skrtel, but ultimately, the first two goals were mostly the fault of Lovren being out of position.

During the build-up of the first goal, Lovren is more concerned with whether Skrtel is marking Dzeko instead of covering 'his' area, the left side of the box.

As the above still shot from the match shows, Lovren was not in the best possible position and was unable to provide proper coverage for Moreno and Gerrard.  In a panic, he heads the ball right to a surging Jovetic.  Sure, Moreno could have done better to clear, but he shouldn't had to in the first place.

Here is a still shot just before the second goal:

Jovetic has the ball and is about to release both Zabaleta and Nasri with an excellent back heel pass through.  Lovren is way out of position to begin with, why he is so far forward is beyond me.  Jovetic has his back to the goal, which for him to gain possession and right himself would take more than enough time for Henderson and/or Gerrard to collapse on him, so Lovren had no business being there.  Once the break starts, Skrtel had no choice but provide coverage on the left, leaving Johnson to mark Dzeko.  Jovetic sneaked in behind, found himself all alone on the right, and the rest, they say, is history.  Had Lovren stayed behind Zabaleta, he would have most likely been able to clear the ball or at least disrupt play enough to prevent the goal, plus Skrtel would have been able to stay more central and allow Johnson to pick up Jovetic.  One could argue that Lovren was trying to set an offside trap, but if that is so, he's doing a terrible job of communicating it to his fellow defenders.

In the City match, a Skrtel-Lovren pairing was ideal being that Lovren is usually better at maintaining his position than Sakho.  Unfortunately he failed to do so.  For Villa, a Sakho-Lovren pairing is more ideal because Villa is dreadful and adding another player on attack seemingly can only help.  Unfortunately it did not, but once again Lovren was somewhat at fault for the goal.  He was beaten by Senderos on the corner, had Manquillo's arm not blocked the attempt, there was a chance of it getting past Lallana and going in.  It instead fell to Agbonlahor.  I would say Balotelli and Moreno's inability to clear it before it got to Senderos was more of an issue than Lovren's marking.

It would have been nice to have Skrtel for Ludogorets.  I can't see him getting caught out of position as much as Sakho and Lovren did.  I didn't expect to draw this conclusion, but after looking over the stats and watching match highlights, maybe the best pairing for Lovren is a seat on the bench.  The only thing he brings so far is tackling and errors.  That may be harsh, but it is clear he has positioning and communication issues, certainly with Skrtel on the latter.  Maybe Rodgers should give him a couple of matches off and some time to think about his latest performances.  I think he's a great defender and player in general, but it seems like he's trying to do too much and it's hurting the side.

Liverpool 4 Borussia Dortmund 0: 5 things learnt

1. Dejan Lovren is the new Boss.  And a much needed one.  He took command of the defence and dared Borussia to attempt attack.  He is what we needed last season when Skrtel and Sakho doted around the field masquerading as defenders who really wanted to just score goals.  That's a bit harsh, but it's nice to be reminded what a centre back who is actually committed to playing defence looks like.  He reminds me of Carra except more athletic.

2. Coutinho is becoming Gerrardinho.  Is it just me or were some of those passes/flicks from the Brazilian very Gerrard-esque?  He's definitely been paying attention to his captain's methods of ball conveyance.  How he did not get chosen for his country for the World Cup is beyond me, but I'm glad he didn't get picked.  The time off probably did him some good.

3. Manquillo is probably already better than Glen Johnson.  No need to beat a dead horse, but me Uncle Joe is probably better than Glen Johnson.  I can't say I was impressed with Manquillo's performance even given the circumstance of just joining the club a couple of days ago, but at least he didn't turn over the ball every time he touched it.

4. We didn't need Gerrard to dictate attack.  And that is huge.  The less our captain has do on the attacking end of the pitch, the better we will be as a side.  If Sterling, Sturridge, Hendo, and Coutinho can dissect defences without the help of Stevie-G, he can concentrate on controlling the middle-third.  I don't think he'll ever be completely cut out of the picture, which nobody wants, but he's also not 26 anymore.  He has plenty of long passes and through balls in store. Though the only stat that should matter to him at this point in his career is league titles. Glory over goals.

5. Aubameyang was playing? The 25-year-old Gabonese striker was invisible today at Anfield.  He scored 13 goals in 26 league matches after coming over from AS Saint Etienne.  In France, he was finally coming into his own, scoring 35 goals in his last two seasons there.  I thought he might be a player worth looking at, before today, I'd pass.  It may have been a friendly, but he was inexistent today and failed to make even the slightest impact.

Steven Gerrard, King of the APEs

Attacking Possession Efficiency that is.  I haven't been posting much lately because I've been working on a lot of stats projects.  One of these is APE.  APE measures how efficient a player is in possession.  It takes in account all positive results from possession and gives relative value to these results and then divides this number by total individual possessions.  A goal is given four times the value of a completed pass and shot on goal, while an assist is given double value to a chance created.  Here is Liverpool's top ten APE from last season (the team APE was 0.43563):

Gerrard	0.46478
Henderson	0.46115
Skrtel	0.45314
Coutinho	0.45302
Suarez	0.45268
Johnson	0.44870
Lucas	0.44444
Sterling	0.43388
Sakho	0.42635
Sturridge	0.42570

Skrtel was more efficient than Suarez? Yes, because he did more with less possession and turned over the ball much less, which is essentially what this stat measures.

I also created a Positive Possession Result Quality, which gives value to the quality of positive result compared to overall 'stripped-down' results. The top ten PPRQ for Liverpool last year (the team average was 0.52788):

Suarez	0.62686
Sturridge	0.60947
Sterling	0.56348
Coutinho	0.54459
Gerrard	0.53748
Henderson	0.52640
Allen	0.51978
Johnson	0.51628
Flanagan	0.51585
Skrtel	0.51147

This basically means that Suarez produced a higher quality result (goal or assist) 62.686% of the time, that shouldn't be much a surprise.  

The players who must prove their worth this season

Mignolet & Reina?
No one seems sure as to whether Rodgers will give Reina a chance to compete for the starting job this season or is just waiting for and/or weighing the best offer for the soon-to-be 32-year-old.  The Spanish International made the trip across the pond as part of the squad for the US tour, but so did Borini.  I think he should be able to stay and fight for the top spot, there's nothing more healthy than a little competition and after last year, Mignolet should know his spot is far from safe.

The 26-year-old Belgian was fifth worst in giving up 50 goals last season and his 93% cross claim percentage was 28th in the league.  The demeanor of Mignolet was what worried me most, he didn't seem too concerned with taking control on defence and a seeming lack of communication between him and his defenders cost us a few goals last year, possibly the league as well.  Personally, if he doesn't show the form that lead us to buy him for £9m from Sunderland last summer, I say start looking for his replacement.

Sakho
The more and more I looked into Sakho's performance last season, the more discouraged I became.  Whenever he was on the pitch, our defence was as fragile as a United fan's confidence, one remote slight and it would collapse.  The biggest piece of the puzzle is what the 24-year-old French centre back did to warrant a -0.52 goals on pitch difference, by far the worst among club regulars.  His statistical output otherwise was good to excellent (92.5% passing success rate), which leaves unquantifiable solutions such as positioning and communication.  No matter what, if he continues the path he is on, which may have been due to game-style adjustment, he shouldn't be in a Liverpool kit by the end of next summer.

Martin Kelly & Glen Johnson
Oh Martin Kelly, too many injuries, too little time, what could have been? And now the clock nears the stroke of your LFC career end.  It's too bad the freshly-turned 24-year-old has not been able to put together a decent amount of appearances since his first team debut in 2009.  He needs a huge season to justify him staying even though his contract is until summer 2017.  I've always thought he had the talent, maybe he simply lacks the physicality to survive English top flight football.

Despite reports of his imminent demise, Glen Johnson did the same things at the same rate he's been doing for the past four years or so.  He set a career high in successful pass percentage at 84.1%, he still posted a 1.11 chance created per 90, and was only dribbled past by 0.82 per 90, his career average is 0.73.  We'll probably never see the kind of season he had when he was 25, but it's a contract season for the soon-to-be 30-year-old, so we should him at his possible best.

Some other players come to mind, but the aforementioned are the most crucial.  If Jose Enrique returns to his form of the previous year and avoids injury, he'll be fine.  Joe Allen will probably stay as long as he wants to be a bit part of a much bigger picture, ditto for Lucas, though the Brazilian, if he is still around come September, will certainly see more pitch time than the Welshman.  It should be business as usual for all else.

Steven Caulker doesn't fancy a tackle

It's not that the 22-year-old is poor at tackling, in fact his 63.8 career percentage is admirable, it's just not his style.  The one-time England international has clearly learned the game from former clubmates Ashley Williams and Ledley King.  Neither of those two were much of tacklers either, but both are/were considered capable defenders.  Caulker still has a way to go before he reaches the level of those two, but at least he's on the right path.

npg90	gc90	cc90	ap90	ccv	TTI90
0.09	0.11	0.27	0.03	9.1	8.1
pass%	bp%	sacc%	shot%	intp90	clrp90
83	22.8	31.3	10.5	1.39	8.47
drbp90	bs90	tp90	tack%	adw90	adw%
0.22	1.15	1.22	63.8	2.8	56.2
gsp90	gap90	gop90	tgop	gopd
1.12	1.56	-0.44	-0.25	-0.19

Stats definitions can be found here.

Those are his career stats from the last three Premier League seasons.  He spent 2011-12 on loan to Swansea, where he paired with Williams, 2012-13 at Spurs, and in the summer of 2013, Tottenham sold him to Cardiff.  Three years, three different clubs, and next season he'll be at either QPR or Liverpool, but is he worth buying?

The thing about Caulker is that he was a much better player in his season with the Spurs than at either Welsh club.  He set career highs in goals and assists per 90 minutes played, successful passing, tackling, and shot accuracy percentage, true turnover index per 90 minutes played, interceptions and clearances per 90 minutes played in that campaign.  A couple were particularly impressive, his 89.7% successful pass percentage with only a 27.8% back pass percentage is outstanding and his 4.3 true turnover rate is one of the best I've ever seen.  I can only imagine how impressive his numbers would be if he came to Liverpool.

Probably his most commendable career stat is his 0.22 dribbled past per 90 minutes. If his 0.26 drbp90 from last season at relegated Cardiff, which would have been second to only Skrtel among Liverpool centre backs, doesn't impress, his 0.06 drbp90 in his season at Tottenham is mind-blowing.  Again, that is a number  so low, I'm pretty confident I have never seen anything like it.  For perspective, Lovren posted a 0.48 drbp90 last season at Southampton, that would have been worst among Liverpool centre backs last season, even behind the 0.44 put up by 'Ole Man' Toure.

If we can get Caulker for the £8m that QPR apparently bid (and was accepted), by all means we should sign him.  Even £10m is an acceptable amount.  He is right-footed and will give Skrtel a run for his money, not to mention the Slovak and Agger are both 29-years-old and not getting any younger.  If Sakho shows improvement and adapts better to the English game next season, he and Caulker would be a force hard to reckon with for years to come.

The transfer terrorists and their sneaky, little dirty bombs

If you are like me, you are already tired of all the speculations and half-fabrications pertaining to potential transfers involving our beloved club.  The silly season is upon us and since my two pence is worth at least one-fiftieth quid, I figure I'll have a go at deciphering through this radioactive mess.  I don't claim to have an advantage of who we may bring in, but I can at least give my thoughts on who is 'surplus to the cause'.

Lucas Leiva
I'm really on the fence about Lucas.  As much as I think we should keep him, part of me thinks the Lucas of three seasons ago is gone and he shan't return.  His injuries have become too frequent and though his passing and ball-handling skills have improved, he appears slower than ever and that's saying a lot considering pace was never one of his strengths.  At least now, with the addition of Can, we won't have to rely on him as much.

Daniel Agger
Absolutely not, losing Agger would be a greater loss than losing Suarez.  He was our best centre back last year and unless Sakho proves his worth early on next season, Agger should be around for a few more years.

Iago Aspas
Here's an interesting stat concerning Aspas... oh wait, there are no interesting stats concerning him.  Give'em a ticket and say bon voyage.

Fabio Borini
Even without the addition of Rickie Lambert, Borini should be shipped out.  In 2692 Premiership minutes, playing for Sunderland, Liverpool, and Chelsea, he has scored 8 goals, 3 of which are penalties, and assisted on 3 more.  For a comparison, he scored 9 goals in 1680 minutes for Roma in Serie A.  He doesn't have the pace nor the technical ability to make up for the lack of pace to make it in the Prem.  I say sell him to Sunderland or use him as bait to get a versatile defender like Federico Fazio.

Ousama Assaidi
Assaidi had a decent spell at Stoke last season, but not enough to really consider keeping him.  His ccp90 of 1.53, shooting accuracy of 45%, shot % of 20%, and a TTI90 of 8.6 are all respectable numbers, but he'll be 26 in August.  If he was 23, I'd say keep him around for another season, but it's time to cut ties and try to get back at least some of what we paid for him.

Jack Robinson
Robinson's loan spell at Blackpool probably did more for his character development than it did for his skills. Blackpool started the season in decent form, sitting on 31 points 17 matches into the season, than the ship ran aground.  They lost 20 of their remaining 29 matches, even bringing in Barry Ferguson as the manager did little to help their slide.  Was Robinson integral to their fall? Not really.  Despite picking up 3 red cards, 2 of which were in their first 17 matches, Robinson's output was respectable:

npgp90	0	pass%	71.7	gap90	1.44	intp90	2.27
gcp90	0.1	bp%	37.3	gsp90	0.83	clrp90	5.3
ccp90	0.77	sacc%	8.3	gop90	-0.61	bsp90	0.35
ap90	0.1	shot%	0	tgop90	-0.61	adwp90	1.4
ccv	12.5	TTI90	11.7	tp90	1.95	adwon%	57.1
				tack %	51.3

Ferguson even deployed Robinson at left mid for 4 matches with mixed results.  Being only 20, I expect him to be loaned out again and hopefully show more promise than last season.

As for Suso, Wisdom, Kelly, Coady, Yesil, and Ibe, unless they vehemently demand to leave, we should hold on to them.  The first three can contribute now, while the latter three probably need seasoning at a Championship side to improve their game.

Coutinho, Sterling, & Agger all had higher gopds than Suarez last year

The winner of 'goals on pitch difference' for Liverpool last season was Coutinho with Sterling and Agger coming up 2nd and 3rd respectively.  Similar to +/- that is used in basketball, gopd measures the amount of goals a team scored against amount allowed while that player is on the pitch.  Here are the results for relevant LFC players from last season:

	mins	pp90	ga	gap90	gs	gsp90	diff
Coutinho	2323	25.8	37	1.43	78	3.02	1.59
Sterling	2220	24.7	31	1.26	69	2.80	1.54
Agger	1421	15.8	18	1.14	42	2.66	1.52
Suarez	2962	32.9	47	1.43	96	2.92	1.49
Sturridge	2267	25.2	31	1.23	68	2.70	1.47
Johnson	2515	27.9	38	1.36	79	2.83	1.47
Henderson	3129	34.8	42	1.21	93	2.67	1.47
Allen	1443	16.0	21	1.31	44	2.75	1.44
Skrtel	3221	35.8	50	1.40	99	2.77	1.37
Gerrard	2895	32.2	44	1.37	86	2.67	1.30
Flanagan	1890	21.0	38	1.81	63	3.00	1.19
Lucas	1896	21.1	27	1.28	49	2.32	1.04
Toure	1443	16.0	20	1.25	36	2.25	1.00
Sakho	1478	16.4	25	1.52	38	2.32	0.79

The gopd average for Liverpool was 1.33 per match, which does not bode well for Gerrard and anyone else below him on the table.  Flanagan is particularly dreadful being his 3 goal scored per 90 is second highest, but his 1.81 goals allowed is worst.  I'm at a loss for words when it comes to Sakho, maybe he just isn't that good, and if you would have asked me last week if selling Lucas was a good idea, I would have said absolutely not, but now I'm beginning to wonder if he's no longer of much value.

I'm not surprised by any of the players in the top five except for maybe Agger, who we should truly not sell, but Johnson at sixth is perplexing.  I figured he'd be much worse.  Maybe we should hold on to him for a little bit longer.

By the way, of all players who played at least 1000 league minutes last season, Aly Cissokho had the highest goal scored per 90 at 3.05 and highest gopd at 1.73. Go figure.

Gerrard & Sturridge are more important than Suarez

Again and again I'm trying to convince myself that the loss of Suarez won't be that great, well, this may be the straw that breaks the camel's back.  I went through each match last year and broke down goal importance according to whether a point was salvaged or gained (crucial goal) or gave us an advantage (important goal).  I did the same for assists as well.  Then I applied a points system: 3 points for crucial goal or assist and 1 point for important goal or assist.  Here are the results:

	crucial goal	imp goal	crucial asst	imp assist	value
Gerrard	5	4	4	4	35
Sturridge	7	6	1	2	32
Suarez	0	11	1	4	18
Coutinho	2	1	0	2	9
Agger	1	1	1	1	8
Henderson	1	0	0	3	6
Enrique	0	0	1	1	4
Sterling	0	2	0	2	4
Aspas	0	0	1	0	3
Skrtel	0	3	0	0	3
Toure	0	0	0	1	1
Sakho	0	1	0	0	1
Johnson	0	0	0	1	1
Allen	0	1	0	0	1

Not a single goal and only one assist from Suarez was 'crucial' to our title chase last year.  He did score 11 'important' goals though, unfortunately that also means he essentially scored 20 'meaningless' goals or goals that wouldn't have mattered had he scored them or not.

We will be fine if Suarez leaves as long as we improve defensively.  Yes, he's fun to watch and I wish he would play the rest of his days in a Liverpool shirt, but in the end, we go on.

Agger was our best defender last season, Sakho was worst

Last season Brendan Rodgers utlilized 16 different line-ups on the back line.  I remember back in the day when Benitez used to change the line-up that often, he was ridiculed as a 'tinkerer'.  The truth is, he was ahead of his time and most successful managers started to do the same including Mourinho and Ferguson. Nowadays it's the status quo for clubs involved in multiple competitions, especially Europe (Sorry Man U).

 Rodgers, though, had a ton of injury issues to deal with last season.  Sakho, Enrique, Johnson, Toure, and Agger all had injury spells, some multiple.  Here are those line-ups along with their stats:

				M	GA	GAPM	CS
Johnson	Toure	Agger	Enrique	2	0	0.00	2
Johnson	Skrtel	Agger	Enrique	1	0	0.00	1
Johnson	Skrtel	Agger	Cissohko	2	0	0.00	2
Johnson	Skrtel	Sakho	Flanagan	3	2	0.67	1
Toure	Skrtel	Agger	Sakho	1	1	1.00	0
Flanagan	Skrtel	Toure	Cissohko	4	4	1.00	1
Johnson	Skrtel	Agger	Flanagan	5	5	1.00	2
Toure	Skrtel	Sakho		5	7	1.40	0
Flanagan	Skrtel	Agger	Johnson	2	3	1.50	1
Wisdom	Skrtel	Sakho	Enrique	1	2	2.00	0
Johnson	Skrtel	Agger	Flanagan	2	4	2.00	0
Johnson	Skrtel	Sakho	Cissohko	1	2	2.00	0
Johnson	Skrtel	Sakho	Agger	1	2	2.00	0
Johnson	Skrtel	Sakho	Flanagan	5	10	2.00	0
Johnson	Skrtel	Toure	Cissohko	2	5	2.50	0
Johnson	Skrtel	Toure	Flanagan	1	3	3.00	0

Those are sorted by goals allowed per match and if we break it down per player:

	ms	ga	gapm	cs	cs%
Agger	16	15	0.94	8	0.50
Cissohko	9	11	1.22	3	0.33
Johnson	27	36	1.33	9	0.33
Toure	15	20	1.33	3	0.20
Skrtel	36	50	1.39	8	0.22
Flanagan	22	31	1.41	5	0.23
Sakho	17	26	1.53	1	0.06

It's pretty clear our most valuable player on the back line is Agger.  It's not even close.  In fact, we only had 2 clean sheets without him.  What's disappointing is Sakho appears to be the biggest liability.  One clean sheet in 17 starts and the highest goal allowed per match average at 1.53.

I'm not sure what Rodgers plans on doing since it was pretty clear by the end of last season that Skrtel and Sakho were his first choice centre backs.  If they continue last year's form, that's not acceptable.  Agger is our best defensive back and I don't know what else proof the gaffer needs.  We will not win the league next year unless we shore up our defense, no matter what hard decisions need to be made.  I like Sakho, but if that means sitting him, so be it.