Former Liverpool defender Phil Thompson has urged Jurgen Klopp to improve his defence and also to breach the market for an out-and-out striker if he intends to compete with his fellow Premier League rivals.
Even though the Reds have carried a near to perfect record against the top-six Premier League sides, their defensive instability has been exposed at times. Take the Premier League opener for instance; Liverpool conceded the first goal in as early as the eight minute and even though we managed to equalise, we slipped away inside three minutes of it. The final score? Liverpool 3 Watford 3.
A 4-0 victory against Arsenal has remained the only positive thing this season so far. In our last 7 games in all competitions, we have won only once; a narrow victory against Leicester City at King Power. Hence, criticism coming towards Jurgen Klopp was quite fair, to say the least. It’s not that Liverpool’s defensive woes have popped out instantly. We have been criticised for the same for the past couple of years, but we have never really found a solution for that.
We needed to add numbers to our defence but we rather opted to sell Mamadou Sakho, hoping that we’d sign Virgil van Dijk. Sure, Klopp is keen on signing another centre-back and judging by the look of things, van Dijk’s arrival is looking more prominent now.
While our defence is shipping goals, our attacking unit has been quite far from what they delivered last season. Since the 5-0 demolition at hands of Manchester City, we have scored just 8 goals in 6 games and have conceded 9.
Hence, addressing the issue, Phil Thompson has said that we should go all out for him should Dortmund make Aubameyang available in the market. Aubameyang is rated at €65m.
“I do feel that come January we need to improve the defenders and get an out-and-out striker,” he told Sky Sports. “If Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang became available then he should be on our hit list.”
Liverpool next face Manchester United at Anfield, followed by games against Tottenham, Huddersfield and West Ham in the span of 20 days, with two Champions League fixtures being slotted in between as well. We do not really have sustainable depth to go all out for all these fixtures, yet Thompson is of belief that we can still finish in the top four this season.
“I honestly believe we will still finish in the top four because we can outgun most teams,” he added.
Quite rightly so, we will finish in the top-4 but if Klopp doesn’t strengthen the back line in January, even a top-4 finish could go for a toss.
