After leading the group and using a lot of rotation, Jurgen Klopp will not be too shaken by his team’s lackluster loss to Union Saint-Gilloie to end their Europa League group stage.

This was a wise decision that will probably pay off, with the players coming out uninjured, having rested a number of important players ahead of three home games in seven days: West Ham United in the Carabao Cup, Manchester United and Arsenal in the Premier League.

Despite this, Liverpool still lost and looked quite boring while doing so. Cody Gakpo was unable to deliver the kind of magical performance that Liverpool may have hoped for, and the team was unable to muster any attacking cohesiveness or stop the home team’s waves of assault.

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How Cody Gakpo performed against USG

Now, it would be unjust to criticize Gakpo too much because, despite his recognized status, the Dutchman didn’t get much help from his wide-ranging and midfield teammates.

However, the 23-year-old remained anonymous and failed to locate areas of the field from which he might establish himself, shape play, and give his springtime counterparts some offensive fluency.

The £120k-per-week superstar, according to Sofascore, managed just one blocked shot entire night, failed at his lone attempt at dribbling, dropped the ball 12 times despite only logging 38 touches.

He did not demonstrate that he is the right guy to take Darwin Nunez’s place at the front of the field ahead of the impending Premier League matchup with United. Nunez is unpredictable yet lively and driven.

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Gakpo will be unhappy about his role, but it’s hard to put the entire blame on him because, as was already mentioned, he was deprived of service throughout most of the affair. For the most part, the younger Reds were ineffective in this dead-rubber match.

Even if Liverpool lost, that isn’t the big story right now; Klopp’s squad is back at the top, and a tough test in Belgium gave a few promising young players the perfect environment to grow into professionals.

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