Lucas loss exposing lack of depth (ESPN article)

by Dave Usher for ESPN

The news that Liverpool's Brazilian midfielder Lucas Leiva will be sidelined for two months with medial knee ligament damage is a big blow to the Merseyside club's hopes of a top-four finish and will surely now force them to delve into the transfer market. Even without the injury to the likable Lucas, Liverpool's midfield lacked depth and was in need of January strengthening, but now, that need has become desperate.

More often than not, manager Brendan Rodgers likes to operate with three midfielders in his team. With Lucas out until mid-March at the earliest, Liverpool now actually have only three midfielders in their squad, four if you include Luis Alberto, and Rodgers would clearly prefer not to include him based on the first six months of the season. Beyond Alberto, there is only 16-year-old Jordan Rossiter providing cover unless Rodgers converts someone else into a makeshift midfielder (perhaps Kolo Toure as a defensive option and Philippe Coutinho as a more offensive one?).

Unless someone is brought in before the end of the January window, it may well come to that, as the likelihood of surviving without any more injuries until Lucas returns seems pretty remote. After all, Steven Gerrard has already broken down with a hamstring injury once this season after playing several games in a short period of time. With the FA Cup now punctuating the Premier League fixture list, Rodgers will need to occasionally rest his skipper to avoid a repeat of that, but with whom can he replace him? Additionally, Joe Allen has had hamstring and groin injuries this season and also missed a chunk of last season with a shoulder problem. He's not exactly an iron man is he? Can he be relied on to stay fit for the remainder of the season? Jordan Henderson is the only midfielder Liverpool possess for whom injuries aren't a worry, but even the most durable players can get hurt occasionally.

The option of playing with just two in the middle is there of course, but given the gruesome spectacle Kopites were subjected to in the first half of the Villa game last weekend when Rodgers started the game playing 4-4-2, that has to be seen as something of a last resort. There have been other occasions when he's deviated from the three midfielders, such as the brief experiment with the 3-4-1-2 system that saw Victor Moses playing behind two strikers. That role looked to be tailor-made for Coutinho, but the young Brazilian was sidelined through injury and when he returned Rodgers had abandoned that system.

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