Just out of curiosity, can anyone give any statistics or a few examples of these moments were Johnson has costs us goals? Like I said Kelly would be my first choice RB with Johnson ahead of him on the wing. But I keep hearing people harp on about "how many goals hes been at fault for", and Im struggling to think of many examples.
I agree he isn't the best defensivly, but honestly think his frailties get blown massively out of proportion.
Forgive me for copying and pasting as on the iPad but this article sums it up for me.
* Johnson's arrival coincided with the club's worst league season since 1994 (in terms of position); worst overall season (all competitions) in decades, which included failure to get out of the group stage of the CL; a horrible 7th place league finish, with the consequent failure to qualify for this season's CL.
* In 2008-9 - prior to Johnson's arrival - 2 games were lost *all season*. Johnson arrived, and he featured in 12 defeats in 35 games (over one third of all the games in which he appeared). Coincidence?
* In his 35 appearances last season, the team conceded 30 goals (with Johnson directly responsible for several) His defensive frailty was exposed time and time again across the season, not only for Liverpool, but for England too.
* Despite Johnson's much vaunted attacking prowess, he managed only 3 goals and 3 assists all season. Then again, that's hardly surprising given that in the 7 years prior to joining Liverpool he averaged a paltry 1 goal and 2 assists a season. Johnson couldn't even beat his career-best figures for Portsmouth in 2008-9, where he got 3 goals and 6 assists in 37 games. Is this the level of return expected from an 18m player who is, apparently, amazing going forward?
* Johnson was directly at fault for several important goals over the season, including (amongst others) both goals in the 2-1 home defeat to Arsenal, and Christian Benitez's equalising goal for Birmingham in the 2-2 draw at Anfield. His mistakes have continued this season with his poor positional play leading to Sunderland's second goal today.
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