Liverpool have just signed Virgil van Dijk, but who wins when you compare the statistics of Joel Matip, Ragnar Klavan and Joel Matip to the Dutchman?
Well, for the £75 million price tag, you’d hope that van Dijk took home the silverwear. The former Celtic man has been a Reds target since the summer and manager Jurgen Klopp will be delighted to have their man.
Matip, Klavan and Lovren have all been brought to the club over the last few seasons to try and tighten up their defence.
Lovren was signed after an excellent season with Southampton, while Matip arrived with high hopes from Schalke.
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Neither have hit the heights that was expected of them and both have made mistakes leading to goals at various times in their Liverpool career.
Luckily, LFC Transfer Room stepped in to try and crunch the numbers and make sense of the deal. They published their findings on Twitter.
📊 | How does Virgil Van Dijk compare to our current centre-backs statistically? Data taken from their all time Premier League record. #LFC
— LFC Transfer Room (@LFCTransferRoom) December 29, 2017
💰 No wonder Liverpool are paying £75M! pic.twitter.com/Akq9XyGPQy
In terms of Premier League starts, only Lovren has made more with 125. Van Dijk has 67, Matip has 43 and Klavan just 32.
The Dutchman beats all three when you look at the percentage of aerial battles won. He wins an impressive 74% of them, while is miles ahead of the 67% that Lovren and Matip claim and the awful 57% that Klavan wins.
Sloppy goals are probably the most frustrating things to concede and Lovren is the key of those. He’s made six errors that lead to goals, while the two existing Reds defenders have made one apiece. Van Dijk has made none.
His tackle success is also the best, although not by much. With 75%, he’s one percent ahead of Lovren and Klavan and three ahead of Matip.
Van Dijk also blows away the competition with headed clearances per game, making 4.2. Lovren only managed 3.0, Matip 2.8 and Klavan 2.1.
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So there you have it. According to the stats, the new singing is head and shoulders above the rest of the team.