Jurgen Klopp's Liverpool need rest time to thrive in the Premier League
Thursday 16 February 2017 17:00, UK
Will Liverpool’s mini-break make all the difference? The stats suggest it might. Adam Bate looks at the numbers that reveal Jurgen Klopp’s men are a very different proposition when they have had seven days or more to prepare…
Liverpool's Monday Night Football trip to Leicester is scheduled to take place 16 days after their previous fixture. That's bad news for the Foxes because when Jurgen Klopp's team are well rested they make for formidable opponents as Tottenham discovered last time out.
The Liverpool boss has since taken the Reds to La Manga and is treating the trip as "a pre-season for the rest of the season" in order to refresh them for the cup-free conclusion to the campaign. The evidence suggests their high-intensity football relies on such preparation time.
So far this season, Liverpool have played 10 Premier League matches after a seven-day break. They are unbeaten in those matches with seven wins and three draws, including memorable victories over Arsenal, Tottenham and the reverse fixture against Leicester.
Throw in thrashings such as the 6-1 win over Watford and it gives Liverpool 24 points from those 10 games. It's a record that suggests that if Klopp got to play all of his Premier League matches after a full week off his team could break the 90-point mark. That's title-winning form and then some.
There is a reason for that run of results. Liverpool's style, their emphasis on pressing and counter-pressing, places huge physical demands on the players. And when the fixtures piled up after Christmas, the team's form began to dip. All hopes of a trophy were dashed.
Liverpool look like they've run out of energy and legs which is a big worry. Is that down to the intensity that they play at, that they train at?
Speaking last month, Jamie Carragher identified some of the key problems. "Liverpool look like they've run out of energy and legs which is a big worry," he told Sky Sports. "Is that down to the intensity that they play at, that they train at? Klopp has got no winter break."
Carragher added: "They are where they are because of the manager and no Europe. Now, with them running out of the legs, that energy, we're maybe seeing what this Liverpool squad is. They don't look as though there's that zip, that energy there."
The Premier League tracking data tells some of the story. On average, Liverpool have covered more ground and made more high-intensity sprints in the 10 matches when they have had a full week to prepare than they have in the 15 matches when they have not.
But it is not just the running. The stats show that Liverpool have made errors leading to shots and goals more frequently in those games, an indication that the strains are mental as well as physical. The latter stages of those matches have proven particularly problematic for the team.
When well rested, Liverpool have scored four goals in the final 10 minutes, picked up two extra points and not even conceded once in that period. Without that rest they have scored once and conceded five times after the 80-minute mark. Predictably, it has had an impact on results.
There was the late equaliser at Sunderland, a game that took place less than 48 hours after playing on New Year's Eve. There was also the late equaliser against Manchester United after seven of the same line-up had started in an EFL Cup semi-final at Southampton just days earlier.
For some this illustrates a fatal flaw for Klopp's title ambitions. In the 15 games in which Liverpool have not had seven days to prepare, they have picked up only 25 points. Such form extrapolated over an entire season has not been good enough for the top four in well over a decade.
That should be a concern for Liverpool fans given that their ambition is to return to Europe next season - a situation that would inevitably increase the team's midweek commitments. For instance, Manchester United had only had six games so far with a full week to prepare.
The better news for Liverpool is that - as the 16-day build-up to Leicester suggests - they are over the worst period of their season for fixture congestion. The trip to the King Power is the first of five games with a guaranteed full week's rest. There could yet be as many as nine.
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That means a chance for Klopp to bring back the football that fans love and their opponents hate to play against; a chance to play the sort of high-intensity game that he favours without expecting the same players to repeat the feat just three days later.
If they can maintain 'week-off form' through to May, Liverpool can still get up to 80 points. That total was not quite good enough to win the title last season and surely won't be this. The problem for Leicester is that such form should be more than enough to see off the reigning champions on Monday.
