Liverpool's unwanted record highlights creativity issue — SkimNews
Get the Sports newsletter
Daily sports — scores, transfers, the storylines from the leagues you actually follow. Free.
- Liverpool lost 1-0 to Arsenal on Sunday without registering a shot on target for the first time in 442 Premier League home games, dating back to 2003; their 17 shots produced 1.05 expected goals.
- Liverpool rank fifth for shots with 140 but ninth for goals and 11th for expected goals; 39% of attempts came from outside the box, the fourth-highest share, while 8% came from inside the six-yard box, the sixth-lowest.
- Dominik Szoboszlai took 93% of his 14 shots from outside the box, the highest proportion in the Premier League; his only inside-box attempt was the opening-day penalty he converted against Newcastle, and he has not scored since.
- Liverpool have created only seven big chances in nine games, second-bottom in the Premier League despite nearly £500m of attacking spending over two years; their 250 box touches rank only eighth.
- Florian Wirtz ranks second for chances created with 22 but has produced no big chances and sits 37th for expected assists at 1.08; Pascal Gross, first on 24 chances, has seven big chances.
- Liverpool have conceded first in five league matches and won one, compared with all three wins when scoring first; after Kai Havertz’s 17-minute Arsenal opener, they spent a league-high 27% of their time building against low blocks.
- Alexander Isak has scored six Premier League goals from shots worth 4.35 expected goals, an overperformance that partly masks Liverpool’s wider shortage of central chances.
Why it matters: Liverpool’s nearly £500m attack has yielded only seven big chances in nine games, leaving goals and expected goals below their shot volume. Conceding first in five matches has also produced the league’s highest rate of low-block build-ups, while Isak’s six-goal overperformance partly masks that shortage of central chances.
Ask SkimNews
