Liverpool’s Liabilities: Four players Brendan Rodgers should offload this summer

Daniel Agger (L)

With Champions League football for next season now confirmed, the press have been abuzz with speculation regarding what options may now be available to Liverpool in the transfer market.

Yet, the Reds now find themselves in a strange, but not entirely negative predicament. Having for so long been an underachieving side, their current squad is littered with players who either may not be able to make the step up to level required by sides serious about competing in Europe’s elite competition, or once promising stars who appear to have diminished in quality over recent seasons.

Here are four players Brendan Rodgers may be wise to consider offloading over the summer, in view of ushering in a new class of player at Anfield.

Daniel Agger

Agger Appearances – PL 2013/14

A one-time fan favourite admired for demonstrating class, poise and something approaching elegance at the back, Liverpool fans have seen so little of Danish centre-back Daniel Agger that a profound sense of disillusionment has been allowed to creep in.

The 29-year-old’s appearance graphics are typically chequrered with crosses, and when he is fit significant question marks hover over his ability to deal with opposing forwards who like to engage defences in physical contests.

Aerially, this has not been a problem for him over the current campaign, though. The Dane has managed to win a highly commendable 41 of 63 headed duels, a success rate of 65%.

In any case, he remains a reasonably highly regarded defender and so cashing in on the ex-Brondby star while his reputation remains in tact may be a wise way to go for the transfers committee at Anfield in the upcoming summer window. Agger is even, once in a while, linked with Manchester City or even Barcelona, so his agent must be doing something right.

Jose Enrique

One of the most divisive characters among Rodgers current crop and one of the most physical full-backs in the Premier League, Jose Enrique, like Agger, has experienced a season plagued by injury.

As a result, the Spaniard has featured only eight times for the Reds during their league campaign, of which two were substitute appearances.

Fitness is not the only unreliable factor of his game, though; the ex-Newcastle man is so often prone to switching off, making costly errors or neglecting his defensive duties. He has, in fact, been guilty of making the highest number of defensive errors per game among the entire Liverpool squad. What’s more, his passing accuracy stands at a lowly 80%, which would see Enrique to play the ball back and forth across a typical Rodgers back four.

Yet the fact remains, in an attacking sense Enrique is often explosive and you would have every right to feel cheated were he to be offloaded, denying us the opportunity to see how the swash-buckling Spaniard would fit in among the new and improved, recklessly Gung-ho Liverpool – just for a game, or two.

Iago Aspas

It’s safe to say, Iago Aspas hasn’t really had a fair crack of the whip.

Yet, with options up front like Luis Suarez and Daniel Sturridge, Rodgers ideally would have like the Spaniard to function as something more in the way of an impact sub, which demonstrably has not been the case.

After a promising Premier League debut, in which Apas carved out five goalscoring opportunities during a 1-0 home win against Stoke, the attackers form took a huge nose dive and in seven appearances since has created just three chances.

He scored an important – and his only competitive – goal against Oldham and demonstrated a good relationship with Suarez during pre-season friendlies, but his individual duel success statistics paint a picture of a forward lacking in both cofidence and inspiration.

Pepe Reina

Simon Mignolet is by no means perfect, but he’s young and a marked upgrade on the Pepe Reina we saw last year. The sight of the Spaniard witlessly chasing down Sergio Aguero, who subsequently lofted the ball into the net from an impossible angle, and abandoning his goal-line during a 2-2 draw last year must be scorched into the memory of more than a few Liverpool fans.

In fact, the statistics from the season so far for Liverpool’s current Belgian shot-stopper compare relatively favourably with the Spaniard. He has kept a higher number of clean sheets, 10, than his predecessor and the same can be said of his superior distribution accuracy rating and the amount of incoming balls he has managed to punch away per 90 minutes. His number of catches, per 90, meanwhile is not far off the much more experienced Jose Reina.

If Liverpool did choose to offload their on-loan goalie, to his current stamping grounds Napoli or elsewhere, it will reportedly be for a figure in the region of £6million.