5 reasons why Liverpool won't make the top four in the 2017/18 season

Despite their 1-4 win over West Ham yesterday, Liverpool still sit adrift of the top four in the Premier League table, although in 6th, they are now on equal points with 5th placed Burnley and 4th placed Chelsea. Jurgen Klopp’s pre-season goal would clearly have been to reach the Champions League spots again – or even push to win the Premier League title – but right now, is it realistic for them to expect to reach that goal?

I don’t think so. Liverpool might see themselves as one of England’s biggest and best clubs and they wouldn’t be wrong, but it’s becoming ever-trickier to reach those all-important top four spots and this season may well prove very difficult for the Reds given their start. Here are five reasons why Liverpool won’t finish in the top four this season.

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#1 There are too many strong sides around them

Having other strong sides like Tottenham around them make life difficult for Liverpool

Klopp might’ve helped Liverpool to progress after the disastrous latter days of the Brendan Rodgers era, but naturally, the Reds’ other Premier League rivals haven’t stood still either. The Premier League right now is as strong as it’s ever been, thanks to a mix of the bigger clubs being able to bring in the best managers and players from around the world, and the smaller sides using smart organisation and wise spending of a substantial amount of money to continually progress, too.

When Liverpool were considered one of England’s ‘Big Four’ in the mid-2000’s, both Tottenham and Manchester City were mid-table clubs at best. They are now two of the country’s most powerful sides, both financially and on the pitch, meaning the Premier League now has a ‘Big Six’ that need to fit into just four Champions League slots. That makes things incredibly difficult when you’re a side like Liverpool, who were arguably playing catch-up to begin with.

Elsewhere? Manchester United seem to be rejuvenated under Jose Mourinho; Chelsea haven’t had the strongest start to the season, but they’re still reigning champions and could go on a strong run at any time, and Arsenal always have at least one great push for the top four in them every season. And that isn’t even touching upon upstarts like Watford and Burnley who are threatening the upper echelon this season.

With all this competition around them, Liverpool are going to find it extremely difficult to make the top four this season.

#2 They’ve already dropped crucial points

Liverpool have already dropped crucial points, like in their loss to Spurs

2015/16 saw Manchester City finish fourth in the Premier League on 66 points, with a total of 19 wins, 9 draws and 10 losses. Essentially, they won as many games as they both drew and lost. Last season Liverpool themselves finished fourth with 76 points, winning 22, drawing 10 and losing just 6, so they won six more games than they lost or drew.

Not even touching upon the improvement in overall league strength over the last two seasons shown by the increase in points needed to finish 4th, it’s pretty clear that judging on Liverpool’s record so far, they’re going to struggle to match that.

Up to this point in the season they’ve played 11 games; they’ve won 5, drawn 4 and lost 2. So essentially, they’ve dropped more points than they’ve won thus far. What’s more, they’ve only played four games against the bigger sides in the league – a 4-0 victory over Arsenal was offset by a dour draw with Manchester United, and heavy defeats – 5-0 and 4-1 – to Manchester City and Tottenham respectively.

It’s not difficult to see a scenario where Liverpool continue to struggle against the bigger sides. Throw in a handful of likely poor results against lower sides – we’ve already seen a couple of them, such as the 1-1 draw with Newcastle – and it’s easy to see that Liverpool are just too likely to drop important points to finish in the Champions League spots. By already having six negative results on their ledger, they’re well on their way.

#3 Their defence is too weak

Liverpool's defence, featuring Dejan Lovren, have let in some appalling goals already

Everyone knows that the key to success in any league is having a strong defence. It’s all well and good being able to shred teams from an attacking perspective, but if you’re shipping goals consistently then you’re always going to struggle in the long run. Just ask Kevin Keegan, who saw his Newcastle side surrender the league to Manchester United back in 1995/96 based essentially on having a leaky defence.

Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp evidently spotted his side’s defensive deficiencies in the summer, hence his chase of Southampton’s outstanding defender Virgil an Dijk. That chase, as everyone knows, didn’t pay off, and now Klopp is being forced to deploy a defence featuring the likes of Dejan Lovren, Joel Matip, and Ragnar Klavan – who, no offence intended, just aren’t Champions League standard defenders. Granted, youngsters Joe Gomez and Trent Alexander-Arnold have performed well thus far and clearly, have bright futures. But that’s not enough to get into the Champions League.

Liverpool have already conceded 17 goals – the most of any side currently in the top 8, and more than relegation candidates Swansea and Bournemouth – and some of those goals have been down to appalling defensive errors, such as Heung-Min Son’s goal for Tottenham, and Joselu’s goal for Newcastle. Given there’s no guarantee that Klopp is going to be able to strengthen than defence in January’s transfer window, it’s pretty clear that Liverpool just don’t have a strong enough defensive spine to finish in the top four.

#4 Their summer signings haven’t paid off

The signing of Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain has been a disaster

While other teams around them signed more players in the summer transfer window, the Reds still splashed a pretty substantial £80m on new blood, and that isn’t including the unknown tribunal fee paid out to Chelsea for the services of young striker Dominic Solanke. That number would’ve been far higher had they been able to persuade Southampton to part ways with Virgil Van Dijk, but as was discussed earlier, the move fell through.

Unfortunately for Jurgen Klopp, it would appear that right now, a lot of that money has been wasted. A club-record £43m of it went on Egyptian forward Mohamed Salah and he at least has been a major hit, scoring 12 goals in all competitions already and generally performing to an excellent standard. If anything he’s been Liverpool’s standout player thus far. But the others certainly haven’t lived up to his lofty standard.

Solanke, as was admittedly expected, has barely played a part outside of cameo appearances in the Premier League and a couple of starts in the Carabao Cup. But Klopp always had him down as “one for the future” anyway. But defender Andrew Robertson has barely been used at all – just 3 appearances – which is shocking given the clear weaknesses in Liverpool’s defence and no injury reports for the Scottish full-back.

And the less said about £35m signing Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain the better. The England international moved to Anfield from Arsenal in a quest for more playing time and a shot at being a central midfielder. He’s received neither, being reduced to just three starts, and his bad form has even cost him his place in the England squad.

Outside of Salah, Liverpool’s signings have performed badly to be frank – simply not good enough for the standard of a top-four Premier League side in 2017/18.

#5 Jurgen Klopp is outgunned

Compared to the likes of Antonio Conte, Jurgen Klopp appears to be outgunned

When Jurgen Klopp first moved to Anfield in October 2015 he received a great amount of publicity, as he was seen as one of the world’s best young managers; an innovator who had used his famed geggenpress tactic to enable Borussia Dortmund to rise up and become one of the most feared clubs in Europe, even overhauling Bayern Munich to be the top club in Germany for a short period.

He was expected to light up the Premier League in a similar way, but thus far that hasn’t really happened. The Premier League already had some of the strongest managers in the world at the time of Klopp’s arrival, and since then it’s gained a couple more world greats in the form of Pep Guardiola and Antonio Conte. Throw in up-and-coming bosses looking to prove their worth like Marco Silva and Sean Dyche, and is Klopp outgunned?

I’d say potentially he is. The geggenpress is no longer an all-conquering tactic and it could be argued that at Tottenham, Mauricio Pochettino has evolved the style even further and even more effectively. And against the tactical brilliance of the likes of Guardiola, Conte and Jose Mourinho, Klopp just doesn’t seem like the progressive genius he did about half a decade ago.

Liverpool may have felt they had made a masterstroke by bringing Klopp in, but like his tactical nous, the likelihood is that it’s already been surpassed – bad news for their top four hopes this season.