Liverpool\u2019s defence of the Premier League title has slipped into unfamiliar territory. The Reds sit 11th and are 11 points adrift of leaders Arsenal after a chastening 3\u20130 home defeat to Nottingham Forest, now led by former Everton boss Sean Dyche. That loss felt like the low point for Arne Slot\u2019s side and has intensified debate about how this campaign will be recorded in the competition\u2019s history.<\/p>\n
Through 12 games Liverpool have accumulated 18 points, the fourth-lowest total recorded by a defending Premier League champion. Only Chelsea in 2015\u201316 (11), Leicester in 2016\u201317 (12) and Blackburn in 1994\u201395 (14) compiled fewer points in equivalent starts. If Liverpool continue at their current rate they will finish on 57 points, a 27-point drop from their title season, which would rank as the third-worst defence by that measure.<\/p>\n
There are precedents for catastrophic falls. Leicester, after their 2015\u201316 miracle, finished 12th in 2016\u201317 with 44 points, 32 fewer than in their title-winning campaign. The loss of N’Golo Kant\u00e9 and the February sacking of Claudio Ranieri, replaced by assistant Craig Shakespeare, were cited among the reasons for their decline.<\/p>\n
Chelsea\u2019s collapse after 2014\u201315 is another reminder: Jos\u00e9 Mourinho was dismissed when the Blues were 16th and just a point above the relegation places after a 2\u20131 defeat at Leicester; Guus Hiddink steadied the side but Chelsea still suffered a 37-point drop to finish tenth. Chelsea later endured a 23-point fall under Antonio Conte yet still finished fifth and won the FA Cup, with Conte\u2019s dispute with Diego Costa and missed transfer targets highlighted as factors.<\/p>\n
Other difficult defences include Manchester United in 2013\u201314 under David Moyes, who inherited from Sir Alex Ferguson and finished seventh, and Blackburn in 1995\u201396, when Sir Kenny Dalglish resigned and Ray Harford struggled before Alan Shearer\u2019s 31-goal season ended with a move to Newcastle United.<\/p>\n
Liverpool also have recent memory of a stuttering defence: injuries in 2020\u201321 left J\u00fcrgen Klopp\u2019s side 30 points worse off than 2019\u201320, though they still finished third. For now, Liverpool\u2019s title defence looks set to join the list of those that unravelled dramatically.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Defending champions Liverpool sit 11th, 11 points behind Arsenal and tracking a poor defence. Today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4686,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[175,172],"tags":[1162,1047,1087],"class_list":["post-4687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-liverpool","category-epl","tag-analytics","tag-champions-league","tag-coaching-change"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4687"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4687\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}