There’s no question Liverpool have endured a difficult start to the 2014/2015 Premier League season. After last season’s impressive second placed finish in which they were fingertips away from having a their hands on the title, the Reds currently sit in midtable and have already lost to the likes of West Ham and Aston Villa. The departure of Luis Suarez has no doubt put the Merseysiders at a disadvantage, as his replacement Mario Balotelli hasn’t lived up to his £16m price tag so far.
In some respects, Brendan Rodgers’ summer spending spree – he spent in excess of a staggering £110m – has rather gone to waste. Many were expecting young talent’s Emre Can and Lazar Markovic to start brightly and show the Premier League they are future world beaters. But their spell in England’s top flight has thus far been plagued with injury. Rickie Lambert has struggled to get in the first team, but he could never realistically last the full 90 minutes anyway, Dejan Lovren is been part of a defence that has leaked sloppy goals and Adam Lallana hasn’t delivered the goods regularly, with most expecting him to be the shining light in the Liverpool midfield.
The current crop of players that have spent at least one season at Liverpool, including Mamadou Sakho and Daniel Sturridge, have failed to find the superb form they reproduced last season. Another player in this category is Simon Mignolet and questions are being asked about the Belgium international ‘s physicality. This has sparked rumours that former FC Barcelona goalkeeper Victor Valdes, who is a free agent, could come in to replace the signing from Sunderland.
Valdes was Barcelona’s number one goalkeeper since 2002, and was considered one of the best shot stoppers in the world, despite not being first choice for his country. So why hasn’t a club snapped him up yet? Well he’s recovering from a serious knee injury, so any club that takes on Valdes will be signing an unfit player. Mignolet is still relatively young, and has vast experience in England’s top flight. If Rodgers wants another goalkeeper to challenge Mignolet, he should wait until January and nab Chelsea’s Petr Cech.
The 31 year old has been replaced as the Blues’ number one goalkeeper by 21 year old Thibaut Courtois at Stamford Bridge. From 2011-2014 while Cech was still number one for the West Londoners and Courtois was on loan at Spanish side Atletico Madrid, in which time the Czech Republic international had a higher save success rate with 76.8%, made more saves per game and claimed more crosses than his teammate.
Meanwhile in the 2013/2013 campaign, Mignolet’s save success rate was 6% lower than Cech and he conceded 23 more goals than, despite Liverpool finishing above Chelsea in the table. Cech’s Premier League prowess is the reason why he still regarded as one of the best goalkeepers in the world, and will certainly make a bigger difference than Valdes if he was to sign for the Anfield club.
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