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This 'We've played the same 13 or 14 players to exhaustion'


dockers_strike
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I keep seeing this statement or similar pop up in threads. The one that goes 'we've played the same 13 or 14 players these last 3 years....' that they are now exhausted and or fucked so now wonder our results this season have been poor.

 

So I did some investigation. Starting from season 2017-18.

 

3 players, Firmino, Salah and Wijnaldum were the only ones to play 50 or more games for the club at 54, 52 & 50 respectively. 23 players played between 14 & 54 games.

 

Season 2018 - 19

 

4 players, Salah, allison, van Dijk and Mane were the only ones to play 50 or more games for the club at 52, 51, 50 & 50 respectively. 19 players played between 16 and 52 games.

 

Season 2019 -20

 

Only 2 players, Firmino and van Dijk played 50 or more games for the club at 52 and 50 respectively. 19 players played between 14 and 52 games. Another 4 players made between 13 & 11 appearances.

 

Obviously players make substitute appearances of anything between a few minutes to 30 and the players they replaced not completing the full 90.

 

The myth we only used the same handful of players over the last 3 years is just that, a myth, There's other players who made a handful of appearances in just the domestic cups. We've used 19 or more players in each season from 2017-18. No players has played in more than 54 games in a season, 2017-18 and that was Bobby.

 

 

 

2019-20

Name League FA Cup League Cup Europe Other Total
Roberto Firmino 38 2 0 9 3 52
Virgil Van Dijk 38 1 0 9 2 50
Andy Robertson 36 1 0 9 3 49
Trent Alexander-Arnold 38 0 0 8 3 49
Mohamed Salah 34 2 0 9 3 48
Georginio Wijnaldum 37 0 0 9 1 47
Sadio Mané 35 1 0 9 2 47
Joe Gomez 28 2 2 8 3 43
Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain 30 2 2 6 3 43
Divock Origi 28 3 1 7 3 42
Jordan Henderson 30 0 0 7 3 40
Fabinho Tavarez 28 2 0 8 1 39
Alisson Becker 29 0 0 5 3 37
James Milner 22 2 2 9 2 37
Naby Keita 18 0 2 4 3 27
Adam Lallana 15 2 2 0 3 22
Adrián San Miguel 11 3 0 4 0 18
Dejan Lovren 10 1 1 3 0 15
Takumi Minamino 10 3 0 1 0 14

 

 

2018-19

Name League FA Cup League Cup Europe Total
Mohamed Salah 38 1 1 12 52
Alisson Becker 38 0 0 13 51
Virgil Van Dijk 38 0 0 12 50
Sadio Mané 36 0 1 13 50
Andy Robertson 36 0 0 12 48
Roberto Firmino 34 1 1 12 48
Georginio Wijnaldum 35 0 0 12 47
James Milner 31 1 1 12 45
Jordan Henderson 32 0 1 11 44
Fabinho Tavarez 28 1 1 11 41
Trent Alexander-Arnold 29 0 0 11 40
Naby Keita 25 1 1 6 33
Joël Matip 22 0 1 8 31
Xherdan Shaqiri 24 1 1 4 30
Daniel Sturridge 18 1 1 7 27
Joe Gomez 16 0 0 9 25
Divock Origi 12 1 0 8 21
Dejan Lovren 13 1 1 3 18
Adam Lallana 13 0 0 3 16

 

 

2017-18

Name League FA Cup League Cup Europe Total
Roberto Firmino 37 2 0 15 54
Mohamed Salah 36 1 0 15 52
Georginio Wijnaldum 33 2 1 14 50
James Milner 32 2 0 13 47
Sadio Mané 29 2 0 13 44
Dejan Lovren 29 0 0 14 43
Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain 32 2 1 7 42
Jordan Henderson 27 1 1 12 41
Emre Can 26 2 0 10 38
Joël Matip 25 2 0 8 35
Loris Karius 19 1 0 13 33
Trent Alexander-Arnold 19 2 0 12 33
Joe Gomez 23 1 1 6 31
Andy Robertson 22 1 1 6 30
Ragnar Klavan 19 0 1 8 28
Dominic Solanke 21 1 1 4 27
Alberto Moreno 16 1 0 10 27
Simon Mignolet 19 1 0 2 22
Virgil Van Dijk 14 2 0 6 22
Philippe Coutinho 14 0 1 5 20
Adam Lallana 12 1 0 2 15
Daniel Sturridge 9 0 0 5 14

Danny Ings

8 1 1 4

14

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17/18, 18/19 and 19/20 we were on the right side of luck when it came to injuries to key players. How many times have we mentioned the bench over those years and compared it with the quality on the pitch. You can't 'replace' a VVD of-course but outside of our best 11 we've had nowhere near as good quality as back-up. It's bitten us on the arse this season big-time. 

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Most of any changes we make is due to the number of sick notes in the team.

 

We have a core of about 15 players who we rely on - the rest only play when Klopp is not arsed in the domestic cups, or when injury forces.

 

The drop off in quality is too big to most of our fringe/cover players.

 

The thread bare nature of squad in certain areas has bitten us in the arse this season as injuries have bitten harder.

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Facts not impressions. The facts are there not some half arsed table that makes it look like we've played with just 10 players a game since 2018.

 

Sure, I acknowledge substituions have been made but the overwhelming fact is we've had between 23 and 19 players play between 14 and 52 games in each season since 2017-18. I dont know how people can say we've a core of 15 when the facts show the core is a minimum 19 players.

 

As for shills, yeah, increase my money, John!

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I think the issue most people have is that once you get past 14/15 first choice players either the standard or fitness reliability (or both) drop pretty quickly (some might say they plummet). The depth of the squad isn't great if the likes of Keita, Shaq and Ox aren't available when required or if the likes of Adrian, Williams, Tsimikas, Ox, Origi, Mini aren't considered good enough to be regular rotation options.  

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30 minutes ago, aws said:

I think the issue most people have is that once you get past 14/15 first choice players either the standard or fitness reliability (or both) drop pretty quickly (some might say they plummet). The depth of the squad isn't great if the likes of Keita, Shaq and Ox aren't available when required or if the likes of Adrian, Williams, Tsimikas, Ox, Origi, Mini aren't considered good enough to be regular rotation options.  

I think this season is exceptional for injuries. chelsea have spent like a drunken sailor on shore leave. Outside of them and city, do any of our rivals have 19 regular players that are any better than ours?

 

Keita cost over £50m and wasnt an injury prone player in the Bundesliga. Id argue he was reckless and ignored our medical team's advice, went to the ACON injured, played one game and made himself worst. So spending big on a player doesnt mean they arent going to get injured.

 

Despite what some claim, Ox was in great form until he got a year long acl injury against Roma.

 

Every 2nd choice keeper is way behind any club's first choice. Who's back up keeper at city, spurs, arsenal, leicester? It's an unnervey facts back up keepers are back ups for a reason, they arent good enough to frequent starters.

 

United have that Henderson who was out on loan at Sheff Utd. He kicked off about being 2nd behind de gea so they had to give him aninflated wedge to stay this season. And he's still kicking off about leaving at the end of this season or replace de gea. We know danny ward is leicester's back up. Arsenal let martinez go and have some lad who's a calamity and makes Karius look solid. Lloris at spurs is just another Mignolet in my opinion and liable to ship silly goals. Fuck knows what their back is like.

 

At the end of this season, div, gini, shaq and taki will likely move on for one reason or another but it still doesnt negate the fact most of those players played in a significant number of games over the last 3 seasons.

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3 hours ago, aws said:

I think the issue most people have is that once you get past 14/15 first choice players either the standard or fitness reliability (or both) drop pretty quickly (some might say they plummet). The depth of the squad isn't great if the likes of Keita, Shaq and Ox aren't available when required or if the likes of Adrian, Williams, Tsimikas, Ox, Origi, Mini aren't considered good enough to be regular rotation options.  

Yeah this.

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The point is that most of our first eleven has played every minute they are available when they are fit. 

 

We rarely, if ever get a chance to rest or rotate these outfield players:

 

Mane

Salah

Firmino

Van Dyke

Henderson 

Wijnaldum

Fabinho

Trent

Robbo

 

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3 hours ago, dockers_strike said:

Facts not impressions. The facts are there not some half arsed table that makes it look like we've played with just 10 players a game since 2018.

It wasn't supposed to be half arsed or even contrary to what you were saying. Was just a table that was already on my phone with information that I thought was useful to the conversation. 

 

You mentioned players making appearances but only racking up a few minutes so I thought I'd help by posting the players with the most minutes. 

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2 hours ago, Aventus said:

It wasn't supposed to be half arsed or even contrary to what you were saying. Was just a table that was already on my phone with information that I thought was useful to the conversation. 

 

You mentioned players making appearances but only racking up a few minutes so I thought I'd help by posting the players with the most minutes. 

The criticism was like if you had posted the top 10 albums for 2020 and then someone claimed you were making out there were only 10 albums released in the year.

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