As Stewart Downing put pen to paper over the summer, there wasn’t a great deal of fanfare made about his signing, nor was there any real fuss in the media. It was an widely-known secret and probably the only signing of the summer that pretty much everybody inside and out of Anfield knew was going to happen.
Personally, I found the signing of Downing rather interesting and felt that he could bring a lot to the side; he could provide the genuine width that we haven’t had for many years (only some good performances from Riera breaking the left-sided curse short-term) and would undoubtedly offer us extra options and a different type of attacking style.
In the main, his performances have been very impressive – for the most part – he’s tricky, quick, with a relatively decent turn of pace and his crosses left-footed usually hit the spot every time, which make the following stats in all competitions all the more strange. Downing has had 23 shots, with 7 on target and has not scored a single goal. He has had second most shots only to Suarez and has not scored in 23 attempts. For a winger, you could normally forgive them not having a hugely prolific goal-scoring record but when a wide-player has managed not one assist from 9 starts and 1 substitute appearance it is worrying.
A quick glance across the whole squad shows that our top-scorer, Luis Suarez, also tops our assists tables with 3, whilst both Charlie Adam and Jose Enrique have both set-up 2 apiece. Perhaps of greater contrast to Downing though is that both Maxi and Raul Meireles have managed 1 assist each this season. In fact, Maxi has managed 1 goal and 1 assist and has only played in 2 games all season which raises the question of why in-form players aren’t being selected (but I’ll have more to say on that in future). As for Meireles, he only had 2 substitute appearances for the Reds before leaving for Chelsea but still managed to set-up Luis Suarez against Arsenal before departing.
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Downing hasn’t been creating quality chances – simple as
He’s been good but I know he can be even better because he has all the attributes to make a great winger. The fact that we are the most wasteful team in the entire league isn’t helping Downing’s case at all, he’d have many assists right now if we had someone like Cavani or Higuain up front. He put in 2 match winning crosses against Utd, both missed. Put in one for Carroll who hit the post from 3 yards out etc…he’s hit the bar himself against Sunderland in the first game, and also scored a superb volley which was saved against Bolton I think it was. Against Norwich he put in 9 balls into the box, 5 were met, all missed. He also had 4 shots blocked and missed 1. He’s just very unlucky at the moment and we as a team are in fact, once we start bagging in goals for fun he’ll climb up the assist charts. Won’t be long now.
great article.
came across this site recently and thumbs up.
I think judgement is reserved on many of our new players precisely because of this profligacy.
The great thing is we’re creating like crazy, and given an extra final pass on a few of them we’d have a fine tally of goals.
Much to look forward to.
Good article. Downing has created numerous chances. In fact I recently saw this statistic that he is in the top 3 players at LFC creating chances at the moment. Just look at the crosses he has put in for Caroll (Or Kuyt against Norwich). It aint his fault that he is not getting many assists.
Downing is a great player and he isnt being recognized for it.
Thank you for this article. Finally some sense from someone. People like Jay Wright (above) need to shut up and stop being so negative.
Jaimie kanwar needs to read this
Dont worry steward, you have got the support of everone in the Liverpool fraternity. Dont let anyting distract you.