Liverpool had quite the time of it in 2021/22. They played all 63 potential fixtures, won more matches than they have in a season before (which is no mean feat when you’re England’s most successful club) and lifted two trophies.
They won 49 games, including penalty shootouts, and plenty of teams won’t have even played that many matches this season, never mind won that number. Yet as their campaign ended in disappointing fashion, rival fans and certain pundits found the idea of a celebratory parade strange.
If not sniping at that, the naysayers were quick to point out that the Reds failed to score in their three cup finals this season, as if winning on penalties is somehow not a legitimate way in which to seal a trophy. When you support a team who haven’t won a cup in decades, it’s hardly surprising you find it confusing.
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People shouldn’t be too surprised by the relative lack of goals either. WhoScored recently noted on social media that only one of the last 11 major finals across international tournaments or in the big five leagues saw either side score more than once, with eight of the matches going to extra-time.
Finals are meant to be hard to win and with so much at stake it’s hardly surprising that they are not high scoring occasions. Failing to score in them also does not undermine the sheer volume of goals Liverpool amassed on their way to Wembley and Paris.
Ignore the finals and the Reds bagged 53 cup goals in just 22 matches this season. Disregard the games against lower league opposition for the sake of argument, and even with the goalless tussles with Chelsea and Real Madrid included Liverpool still scored 43 goals in 21 cup fixtures.
Nonetheless, even though Jurgen Klopp’s squad only failed to score six times in 2021/22, it did occur three times in finals. With that record they could easily have finished the season empty-handed, which would’ve been incredibly difficult for the club and their supporters to take.
It wasn’t as if they didn’t have excellent opportunities in all three games though. Using expected goal values, it’s possible to run a simulation to determine how many goals a team was likely to score from the chances they had. The team on the Anfield Index Under Pressure podcast did this for Liverpool’s three finals and the findings were extraordinary.
They found the Reds stood a greater probability of scoring 15 times than not at all. While that was at the extreme end of the scale, six or seven goals were their most likely haul.
In light of their defeat in Paris it’s obviously most irritating that they 'should' have scored two goals against Real Madrid. Only twice in the last five years has Thibaut Courtois faced as many expected goals on target as he did against Liverpool, and in both cases he was beaten four times. As Klopp noted after the match : “when the goalkeeper is man of the match then something is going wrong for the other team.”
Even if you’re an xG sceptic, the simple shot numbers tell a similar tale. In their 330 Cup final minutes this season, Liverpool had 60 shots, 17 of which were on target and eight of which were opportunities of suitably high quality to be deemed clear-cut chances by Opta.
In the League Cup final, the starting front three of Luis Diaz, Sadio Mane (twice) and Mohamed Salah each had a big chance but failed to score. In the FA Cup, glorious opportunities fell to Diaz, Diogo Jota and Andy Robertson only to go begging, and the Portuguese forward was unable to get enough on a late clear-cut chance in Paris too. Even the four of the above which Liverpool put on target should’ve led to at least two goals based on historic conversion rates, but it was not to be.
If amateur analysts and football writers can spot these things, there’s no doubt the data experts at the club can, and the same people who knew Klopp was unlucky in his last season at Dortmund will feel the same about the Reds’ lack of cup final goals. It won’t soften the blow of losing the Champions League final, but it will certainly ensure nobody will be bothered by what those outside the club think.
