The Merseyside club will be hoping to see a new dawn of real success as their manager Jürgen Klopp is getting ready to start his new season. There is no doubt that the German gaffer has done wonders in his limited time at Anfield last season. Taking the side which was thought to be the weakest in terms of confidence to two cup finals is surely not an easy task.
After a great job and an average finish last season, the manager will be working to build the team from the beginning. He has already replaced the error-prone shot stopper Simon Mignolet with Loris Karius and also filled the void of the centre back area by bringing Joel Matip and besides that, he will also welcome the young and dynamic Marko Grujic.
Now, we all are aware Liverpool’s current squad is studded with midfielders and the squad will be congested if more midfielders are brought. Klopp will have to assess the future of the current players in order to bring names, and we are sure that he has started working on that.
Now, according to the reports, Liverpool are currently the favourites to sign Polish midfielder Piotr Zielinski from Italian side Udinese. The 22-year-old spent 2 seasons with Empoli on loan from Udinese and has caught the eyes of Klopp as well as of Napoli.
On the other side, the Merseyside club are also reportedly chasing the struggling Real Madrid’s midfielder Mateo Kovacic. So, here we will compare both the players and will try to figure out, who would be the best signing for Liverpool:
Matteo Kovacic’s playing time was cut short at the Santiago Bernabeu due to the brilliance of Modric and Kroos. He was only able to make 25 appearances for the Los Blancos and was unable to net any goal. The Majority of appearances came as a substitute. On the other hand, Zielinski was a regular starter for Empoli and made 35 appearances for the side, scoring 5 goals.
Coming on to the attribute of creating chances, it is Zielinski, who wins the round as he created 52 chances for the team where 4 were converted into the back of the net. Furthermore, Kovacic was only able to create 18 chances last season and bagged 2 assists.
But when it comes to distributing the ball, Kovacic is an easy winner as he averaged 91 % of passing accuracy and completed 669 passes in his limited game time. Piotr, on the other side, had a passing accuracy of 82% and completed 1333 passes.
Being a defensive playmaker, Zielinski comes out as a clear winner when talking about the defensive actions. Piotr averaged 3 defensive actions per game, while Kovacic averaged just 1. The Polish international also won 51% of his average duels and was successful in his 89 out of 131 take ons. Kovacic on the other hand, won just 47% of his average duels and was quite lose in defending.
Liverpool are having sufficient attackers in the form of Coutinho, Firmino, Lallana and Origi, and therefore buying a midfielder, who prefers attacking rather than defending makes no sense. On the other hand, buying Zielinski will give the team a perfect partner for Can, and their defensive woes will have a worthy conclusion.
