After losing the Europa League final Jurgen Klopp did state that Liverpool will have to deal with a lot of changes next season, most of which stemmed down to the players at the club. The Premier League club had struggled for consistency last season and the Europa League final was a prime example of that.
Daniel Sturridge gave the Reds the lead with a sublime goal, but they capitulated in the second half, eventually losing the game 3-1. There have been calls to replace a number of players, especially in the defence and another star who has been linked with a move away from the club is Daniel Sturridge.
This isn’t to say that the English attacker has been poor for the club, far from it, in fact Sturridge has the best goals to games ratio in recent years for the Liverpool team. The problem has been his lack of fitness and his constant injury issues, which have reduced his playing time drastically for the Premier League side.
Sturridge only played 25 games in all competitions for the Reds last season and the season before that, he just played 18 games in all. When most players end up playing at least 50 games for the club in all competitions, Sturridge has only done half of that and him taking up the wages while being on the treatment table is not the best thing for Liverpool.
The Reds might have gotten Christian Benteke to play in Daniel’s absence, but the Belgian also struggled last season and more often than not, his place was taken by another young Belgian, Divock Origi. Sometimes even Roberto Firmino would be played as a striker but Sturridge’s future is a big cloud as next season the Reds would have the services of Danny Ings again, who would have recovered from a horrific injury last season.
Sturridge though, seems to be made of glass and more often than not, he will get injured for the Reds and even though he is the best finisher in the team and arguably in the England team, his injury record is his biggest flaw, something you can’t blame on the striker as well.
Liverpool need a top striker to constantly play games. A striker is only as good as the number of games he plays and gains confidence, Sturridge however can’t get his rhythm going simply because he is injured so often and barely has a chance to string together 10 games in a row.
The Reds need to think fast and maybe selling the striker and replacing him is the way to go. Sturridge is a luxury striker which the Premier League side cannot afford to go and if he does not play the majority of the games in the first half of the nest season, he could be off in the winter transfer window.