Former Premier League forward Dean Ashton wasn’t impressed by what he saw from the Liverpool defence in their defeat to Leicester City.
The reigning league champions were put to the sword by a rampant Foxes side who are maintaining their push for a top-four spot this season. But Jürgen Klopp’s men certainly didn’t help themselves throughout the game, most notably with some incredibly poor defending for Leicester’s latter two goals.
And as heard on the TalkSPORT Daily podcast, Ashton doesn’t see things getting a whole lot better in the near future until the club’s main central defenders come back to full fitness, with new signing Ozan Kabak coming under intense scrutiny.
He said: “I think that was a real, real worry if you’re a Liverpool supporter, and it’s not suddenly going to change. You’re not suddenly going to get Van Dijk or Joe Gomez back. Kabak’s your new man, will we ever see him again? That was a tough day for him.”
Is it too early to start judging Kabak at Liverpool?
Yes
No
TIF Thoughts on Dean Ashton’s comments about Liverpool’s defence and Ozar Kabak…
Ashton might be in danger of jumping the gun a little bit. He is right to some extent that the club aren’t the same without Van Dijk and Gomez, and this season was always going to be a struggle without them, and Liverpool fans might have to accept this could become the norm going forward for the rest of the season.
But to dismiss Kabak straight away on his debut just seems a little harsh when he hasn’t had a proper chance to bed into that Liverpool side. And coming up against the fourth-best attack in the league in terms of goals, which includes arguably one of the best strikers in the league in Jamie Vardy, it wasn’t exactly a warm welcome for him into the league.
If these performances keep up, then you can start to question him and his abilities. But to do it after one game just doesn’t seem fair on him.