Once again, Liverpool’s Diogo Jota was the man of the moment on Sunday evening as he struck late on against Nottingham Forest to book Liverpool’s second trip to Wembley of the season. The Reds’ Championship opponents proved a tough nut to crack in Sunday’s FA Cup quarter-final and managed to keep the tie to 0-0 heading into the final 15 minutes of the match.
But with extra-time looming, Jota latched cleverly onto a superb cross from Kostas Tsimikas and poked the ball into the Forest goal. That strike proved decisive and set up a mouthwatering semi-final clash with Manchester City next month.
Since his arrival at the beginning of last season, Jota has highlighted himself as a well-rounded and versatile attacker who has been useful in playing a number of different positions within Jurgen Klopp’s side. That’s exactly what Liverpool insiders would have predicted from the 25-year-old, which is why they were so keen to sign him.
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However, his return in terms of goals may have come as a surprise. In both Premier League campaigns at Wolves, Jota failed to net more than nine league goals in a single season. He was perhaps perceived as a great attacker more than necessarily a standout goal-getter.
He matched that total of nine goals for the Reds last season, despite missing several months of action due to injury and has already surpassed the same this season with 13. There is of course still a quarter of the campaign to go.
When we open up his goalscoring returns to all competitions, the Portuguese attacker’s strike against Forest on Sunday was his 32nd in a Liverpool shirt. That alone is impressive, yet perhaps what stands out more so is how many of those efforts have proved decisive in terms of results for Liverpool.
This has especially been the case this season. Including the winner against Forest, Jota has scored eight ‘crucial goals’ so far. Although there’s a reasonable case to be made that every goal is important, in this instance, a ‘crucial goal’ is defined as a strike that handed Liverpool the lead when the game was level or proved the winner on the day.
That’s a remarkable return. For comparison, Mohamed Salah has scored 28 goals this season, nine more than Jota, yet only seven of those strikes can be defined as ‘crucial goals’.
To further highlight the magnitude of this feat, we can even throw it back by comparing him to another Reds hero in one of his best-ever Liverpool campaigns. In the eyes of many, Luis Suarez produced one of the best individual attacking campings of any player in the Premier League era back in the 2013/14 season, scoring a stunning 31 times. But again, just seven of those efforts proved ‘crucial’. That’s one less than Jota.
It’s hard to summarise just how Jota manages to be Liverpool’s main man so regularly when they need it most. However, the evidence is there that he continues to be just that. He’s undoubtedly got more starring roles to play between now and the end of the season as Liverpool continue to chase history.
