Football is such a low scoring sport that matches can turn in favour of one side in a heartbeat. Liverpool potentially saw this to their cost when they lost 4-1 at Manchester City last weekend.
Having taken the lead, the Reds had a good opportunity to double their advantage through a counter-attack. Unfortunately, Mohamed Salah was unable to square the ball to Diogo Jota thanks to some fine defensive covering from Jack Grealish. A minute later, City were level.
There was another pivotal period of similar length shortly afterwards. Having been booked for a foul on Jota, Rodri committed a near-identical offence against Cody Gakpo just 80 seconds later. Despite this, referee Simon Hooper opted not to dismiss City’s defensive midfielder when it looked inevitable that he would.
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It’s impossible to know how the match would have unfolded had the home side played with a man fewer for an hour. Speaking after the game, Jurgen Klopp stated it would probably have had little impact if Rodri had have been sent off.
“Could he have got a second yellow? Yes, probably. He will not get it now,” Klopp said. “I’m not sure we would have won today against 10 men, to be honest.”
The Liverpool boss may be correct, so poor was the second-half performance from his charges. However, nobody could blame Klopp if he reflected on how relatively few opposing players have been shown a red card in the Premier League during his time in charge.
Remarkably, you must look back to his very first match at Anfield for the last time someone was dismissed for two bookable offences. What makes it stranger from this vantage point is that the player in question was Sadio Mane, who also scored for Southampton in a 1-1 draw.
On average, a second yellow card is shown for every 68.7 bookings which occur. Therefore, the law of averages suggests Liverpool should have seen six players sent off against them for two bookings in the last eight seasons, rather than having Mane standing alone.
There’s no easy way to check for examples of players who committed fouls against the Reds after being booked. Anyone who receives a caution tends to play in a restrained fashion for the remainder of the match and it may be there aren’t many instances of players who should’ve been sent off against Liverpool for two bookings.
Yet while that may be true, Crystal Palace have seen 12 opponents sent off for two yellow cards since the summer of 2015, to lead the Premier League for this period. Remarkably, James Milner has fallen foul of the Eagles twice, being dismissed in this manner against them in 2016 and 2019. He alone has been sent off for a pair of yellows more times than all opposition players have against Liverpool in the Klopp era.
Arguably more remarkable than Palace’s total is Aston Villa’s tally of 11 opposition reds for two yellows, considering they have only been in the division for five of the last eight campaigns. Even Hull City (with Andy Robertson among their ranks) benefited from two in 2016/17, their sole Premier League season in this period). It’s hard not to think the Reds have been sold seriously short by the officials.
In fairness, the balance has been redressed somewhat by 10 straight red cards to opposing players, just three shy of the most (with Chelsea top of the pile). But that still leaves Liverpool 12 behind Palace and bottom among the established big six clubs for sendings off in total.
The Reds’ long run without a league penalty finally ended in their defeat at Bournemouth. At a time when a little good fortune would help a struggling side, they haven’t had much luck with opposition red cards either, and that stretches across Klopp’s time in England too.
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