Liverpool can bounce back after another awful January

Rafael Benitez knows how to finish with a flourish (this is a fact!)

Liverpool have won just three of their last ten games which has led their title odds to drift out to 8/1 with Bet365 and Boylesports. Here are a few reasons why Rafael Benitez’s side aren’t out of it yet:

» Liverpool have failed to win a league game this January, drawing all three that they contested, but that is nothing new. Last season they played four league times in January, drawing three and losing one.

» After last season’s January slump they went on to finish the season in emphatic style. They won eleven, drew three and lost one of their final fifteen, meaning that they were comfortably the best team in the league from February onwards. Over that period they averaged 2.40 points a game to Manchester United’s 2.14.

» The post-January flourish was also the difference maker for Rafael Benitez’s first ever league title while in charge of Valencia seven seasons ago. By the end of January that season they were fourth in La Liga, four points off top, having been handicapped by drawing nine of their first 22 (compared to Liverpool’s nine in 23).

» However from February onwards Valencia took eight points more than any other team in the league, winning twelve, drawing three and losing one of their final sixteen.

Posted: January 29th, 2009 by Michael Lintorn |