The noise around Milos Kerkez has quietened in recent weeks.
Liverpool’s summer-signing left-back has been under significant scrutiny since his arrival from Bournemouth for around £40million ($53.6m at the current rate), due to displays that frequently ranged from erratic to just bad, and which prompted calls for title-winning veteran Andrew Robertson’s return to the starting XI.
When Robertson was reinstated, Liverpool promptly secured back-to-back victories against Aston Villa and Real Madrid, which did not help Kerkez’s cause. Neither did former Manchester United and England full-back Gary Neville saying on his podcast that the 22-year-old Hungary international looked like a “youth-team player” during the 2-1 defeat against Chelsea in October.
Fast forward a couple of months, however, and the picture has changed.
Kerkez’s selection is no longer a cause of consternation and Liverpool’s form is improving, with coach Arne Slot’s side now unbeaten in five matches, having kept three clean sheets during that run. Kerkez has started three of those games, helping deliver two of the clean sheets.
Last season, Slot gave his left-backs a quite reserved role on the pitch and spent most of that campaign employing a method of build-up where both full-backs remained deep. That tactic continued into this season, but it does not play to Kerkez’s strengths. He is best as an underlapping or overlapping full-back, rather than a ball progressor from deep.
When we look at his most common passes of 15 or more yards this season, the top two are ones played in his own half and backwards towards a centre-back, highlighting the limitations of his ball progression.
The graphic above shows he can progress the ball forward, but it’s his sixth-most-common type of pass — crosses into, or at least towards, the opposition penalty area box — that Liverpool would want to see more of.
One of the features of Kerkez’s game during his two seasons with Bournemouth was an ability to get to the byline and provide cutbacks for team-mates. That type of pass is absent from the above graphic, which points to the lack of relationship that has been built between him and left-winger Cody Gakpo.
Netherlands international Gakpo is known for receiving possession and cutting inside before delivering a cross or shooting. When Kerkez offers the Dutchman an underlap or overlap, he is frequently ignored. At other times, the pass to him lacks quality.
“For me, he’s been a bit unlucky that Cody has used mainly his biggest strength of coming inside and hitting the target, but we’ve shown Cody as well that there were a few moments that maybe playing the ball towards Milos would have been the better option,” Slot told reporters during a press conference in October. “So again, an example of two players playing together who need to find their connection even better than they already do.”
Slot needed to find solutions to several problems as Liverpool’s title defence lost its way with six defeats in seven league matches after opening with five wins in a row.
In these past five games, the tactical switch he came up with, which coincided with star forward Mohamed Salah’s removal from the team, has benefited a number of players, Kerkez among them. He started in the victories over West Ham and Brighton (both 2-0), as well as the 3-3 draw with Leeds United.
Liverpool’s narrower setup, featuring more midfielders and fewer attackers, afforded both full-backs more licence to get forward because of the shield provided for the defence by their colleagues in central areas of the pitch.
It was a focus of the opening 25 minutes against Brighton when, very early on in the game, Kerkez and right-back Joe Gomez were taking up positions in advance of Liverpool’s entire midfield.
What was noticeable in that game was the role of Curtis Jones, who dropped from midfield into the left-back position — often where Kerkez would have been in previous games. This allowed the latter to move forward up Liverpool’s left flank.
The team selected against Brighton was another variation of Slot’s current approach, with Florian Wirtz playing on the left due to a Gakpo injury, Salah’s situation and striker Alexander Isak only being fit enough for the bench.
Throughout, the approach for the full-backs has remained consistent
When we look at the pass networks for Liverpool’s most recent games, it is noticeable how high and wide the left-back has been. Because of the focus on flooding central areas, Kerkez or Robertson has to provide the width on that side. It is the same on the other flank for Gomez.
Notice, again, the position of Jones in the past three games. The midfielder is virtually right on top of the left-back to offer support, but also cover space when Kerkez pushes upfield.
Jones did not start against West Ham but, in the image below, it is Alexis Mac Allister dropping deep from midfield in that game. Once again, full-backs Kerkez and Gomez are both more advanced than Liverpool’s four midfielders.
When we move the above passage of play on (see the GIF below), the influence Kerkez can have in attacking areas is clear, as he manages to slide a ball infield into the path of Wirtz. The German’s subsequent cross, however, is too far ahead of Isak.
Liverpool have struggled for an out-ball for the majority of this season, but Kerkez can provide that. Even when playing with Gakpo.
In this next example from that West Ham match, the Dutchman, though he is a winger rather than a striker, has moved to a more central position, creating space for his team-mate on the Liverpool left.
With Gakpo drifting inside to receive the ball, that opens up the possibility of more successful overlaps.
There were signs against Nottingham Forest in the opening 30 minutes of last month’s 3-0 home defeat that more emphasis was being placed on getting Kerkez into better crossing positions, but that got lost because of what happened in the following hour. Kerkez created two chances from open play against Sean Dyche’s side that day, and has been credited with creating one chance in each of the Premier League games since.
Defensively, Kerkez showed his qualities when up against Noni Madueke of Arsenal in the third game of the season, and Slot has praised his one-on-one defending throughout the campaign.
There have been lapses, including against Newcastle in August for Bruno Guimaraes’ header and his poor positioning for PSV’s second goal last month, but that was always possible, given Kerkez only turned 22 in early November.
He continues to want to be on the front foot and defend aggressively. This can get him in trouble — against Brighton, there were two occasions he got skipped past by Yankuba Minteh after he dived in. That Kerkez has faced Minteh and West Ham’s Jarrod Bowen in recent weeks and kept them both relatively quiet suggests he is no longer needing to be looked after in the way Liverpool’s centre-back and captain Virgil van Dijk seemed to be doing in his first few months at the club.
This is still not the best version of Kerkez, but he has looked more comfortable and in control in recent matches.
Liverpool’s altered approach plays a role in that, as does his tweaked role.
Slot can get much more out of Kerkez in an attacking sense than has been seen so far, but in a period of the season when Liverpool needed to stabilise, he has helped them do just that.
