Following a poor start to his Liverpool career, defender Dejan Lovren has had his fair share of critics since he traded Southampton for Merseyside in a big money move over the summer.
While the Croatian centre-back was tipped to solve the Reds defensive woes, the 25-year old has done everything but with stats showing that he’s the most error prone defender in the Premier League — though he’s in good company with both Martin Skrtel and Alberto Moreno, another summer transplant, hot on his heels for the dubious honour. Despite his well publicized problems, Liverpool legend and Sky Sports pundit Jamie Carragher has thrown his backing behind the embattled defender and has insisted that the Reds will start keeping their sheets cleaner in the near future.
“I thought he was excellent for Southampton last season and that is the reason Liverpool bought him but every manager has a different way of doing things,” the retired Red told the Liverpool ECHO. “Liverpool’s full-backs are more offensive and so are going to leave you more exposed, that could be something to look at because Brendan Rodgers likes his full-backs to get forward. Maybe that is something he has either got to get used to or if he is struggling with that then Liverpool have to curtail it and change the small details of how they set-up slightly because you want to get the best out of him.”
Liverpool brought in a number of defensive recruits over the summer as boss Brendan Rodgers looked to improve on last season’s failings at the back, but with 15-goals — one more than they’ve scored — conceded already, it’s not looking like they’re going to better the 51-goals they allowed last year. “Eventually they will start keeping clean sheets, they have to, whether that means them changing a few small details about the set-up of the team, I don’t know” continued Carragher before insisting that Liverpool have to stay the course. “But when you pay that much money for a centre-back you have to persist with it and get him through it. Get Lovren to learn your values but it is also about getting to know him and playing to his strengths and weaknesses.”
