PL Preview: Will Liverpool Be Left Counting the Costa of a Porous Defence?

One can only hope the politeness espoused this week will not be extended to Friday evening. Less a fixture that has simmered over the past decade or so than spat like a steak thrown onto a scorching, well-oiled pan, Chelsea vs. Liverpool is traditionally a game of such ill will it elevates acrimony to an art form.

In days of yore, Jose Mourinho and Rafa Benitez on the same touchline was more toxic than a pair of fractious skunks engaging in a gas-off. Yellow tape replaced chalk to mark out their respective technical areas, while fourth officials were handed overtime and a helmet.

Luis Garcia's "ghost goal" is still debated with ferocity so partisan a non-football fan listening in could conclude Lubos Michel, the referee in 2005, had not yet made up his mind and was instead weighing up closing speeches. It is a ghost Mourinho has never been able to exorcise fully.

Rivalries forged through genuine dislike as opposed to being assumed due to geographical proximity may lack the same heritage, but they tend to (over) compensate for it in terms of venom, often of the malevolent kind. In the 1970s, Chelsea and Leeds United had a rivalry so X-rated that Hugh Hefner was sometimes sent in as a mediator when things got out of hand.

When former Premier League referee David Elleray watched a rerun of the 1970 FA Cup final between the two clubs, he said he would have sent off six players and booked 20. On the day, there was a solitary caution: Ian Hutchinson of Chelsea.

All of which, admittedly on an infantile level, has made the mutual appreciation and backslapping between Antonio Conte and Jurgen Klopp this week a little disconcerting. In the sanitized goldfish bowl that is the Premier League, a fixture made for Friday nights has traditionally been the kid who takes a leak in a crowded swimming pool. Long may it continue to be unapologetic in its bad behaviour.

Klopp has dubbed his counterpart, via Sky Sports, the "Pep Guardiola of Juventus", which if not meant as a surreptitious reference to the contentious issue of Conte's hairline, is quite the compliment. Conte has responded in kind by calling Klopp: "One of the best in the world. I think he is also showing his capacity at Liverpool to be a great manager."

The most animated and expressive pair since Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin were miming gestures for laughs may be pals for now, but civility is only ever one Diego Costa mistimed tackle/theatrical fall/pinch/eye gouge (delete where appropriate) away from turning into churlishness. Even if Costa does his best choirboy impersonation, David Luiz on his second Chelsea debut, having returned to the club from Paris Saint-Germain on transfer deadline day, will almost certainly be the proverbial loaded gun from the first minute.

Serenity may prove to be short-lived at Stamford Bridge.

The Premier League's finest agent provocateur is back to his truculent best having scored four times in as many Premier League matches, picking up three bookings along the way. West Ham United, Watford and Sunday's opponents Swansea City all felt Costa was fortunate yellow never turned to red for subsequent indiscretions.

He less walks the tightrope of gamesmanship than ties it into a lasso before using it to trip up opponents. It's often said Costa could start a fight in an empty room, but then why would he enter a room where there is no one to fight? Let him chair a discussion between the Dalai Lama and Kofi Annan and they would probably end up on the floor wrestling having fallen out over who is the most peaceful. Henry Kissinger he is not.

In Conte's media briefing on Thursday, the assembled press were told the Italian has no plans to temper his striker's natural game and was "not worried" about his temperament, per the Times' Gary Jacob. A tackling style based on politician Boris Johnson's when faced with Japanese children is presumably not a concern either. 

Two more bookings will invoke an automatic one-match ban, but given the start Costa has made to the new campaign, it is hardly a surprise Conte—no angel in his own playing days—is largely turning a blind eye to a devilment Chelsea so sorely lacked in last season's abject title defence. Victory on Friday would take Chelsea to within two wins of matching last term's embarrassing record of five maximum hauls from 19 home games.

It must be hard to advocate complete calmness when your own matchday routine in kicking every ball funnels Brian Glover's PE teacher Mr. Sugden in Kes. Thibaut Courtois tends to let him score in training; it's just easier that way.

Conte sees Costa as more sinned against than sinner. The Swansea game, the first points Chelsea have dropped this season following a 2-2 draw they dominated, lends credence to such rhetoric. No player this season has drawn more fouls than the seven Costa won at the Liberty Stadium, three of which resulted in bookings for Swansea players. His retaliation was a pair of splendidly taken goals.

Costa got the shock of his life when Jordi Amat took his man-to-man marking responsibilities too far and kicked him out of bed on Monday morning.

Klopp has said while Liverpool need to match Costa's aggression on Friday he would never instruct his team to provoke an individual with the sole intention of getting them sent off, per the Guardian's Andy Hunter. He might not, but his players will.

On the contrary, he praised Conte for the work he was done with the striker in such a short time frame, dismissing the notion Costa has been the beneficiary of some lenient refereeing himself. Given an insistence his own forwards play on the front foot with intensity, it should be no surprise he is a big fan of the Spain international.

"World-class," was his glowing assessment when asked to describe the Chelsea centre-forward. "If other supporters love you, it's not a good sign. He is a real warrior (think Dothraki, Game of Thrones) on the pitch. He uses his body all the time—that is his quality—and he was nearly unstoppable against Swansea."

How, or if, Liverpool can stop him will be one of the biggest factors in deciding Friday's game.

Having scored just six times in Mourinho's final nine months in west London, it was Costa, along with Eden Hazard (waspish in his comments about the Portuguese this season) and Cesc Fabregas (the exact opposite, hint Jose), who was accused of being a malignant influence in a dressing room long-since indifferent to the (not so) Special One's waning powers of persuasion.

Chelsea supporters booed Costa in the home game against Sunderland in December 2015, which followed Mourinho's dismissal. There's a joke somewhere about Costa getting Mourinho the sack, given his brace against the Swans took him to 16 goals in 24 games since last year's Christmas period.

It was no surprise when he was linked over the summer with a return to Atletico Madrid, whom Chelsea paid £32 million to lure him from LaLiga to the English capital in July 2014. In his final season in Spain, 27 goals in 35 appearances helped propel Atletico to the title, so perhaps the relatively modest fee informed Chelsea they were buying a goalscorer, not an angel.

After his annus horribilis last term, Costa has started this season as he did his first at Chelsea. He ended that campaign a Premier League title-winner. A rumbustious presence, as ever, he looks healthier and sprightlier than in his final few months under Mourinho, when it seemed as though his entire body was made up of white bread.

Where once slovenly in his movements, he touched the ball 58 times against Swansea, a remarkable figure for a solitary frontman. When on his game, Costa has that rare capacity to never look lonely, such is the intelligence of his hold-up play.

According to Opta, he also took part in a season-high 22 duels. Far be it for me to be the killjoy, but the last thing I'd recommend is placing a flintlock pistol in Costa's hands. 

"

Photographer: "Just act natural guys."

Diego Costa: https://t.co/eQZVe3JiSs

— GeniusFootball (@GeniusFootball) September 15, 2016"

Lucas Leiva, after earning his first assist in years in gifting Jamie Vardy a comical goal last weekend, is unlikely to be relishing the battle with Costa.

Otherwise manfully filling in at centre-half in the absence of Dejan Lovren, who has been passed fit for Chelsea, the Brazilian's moment of madness arrived at a time when Liverpool were cruising 2-0 against the champions. It perfectly illustrated an Achilles' heel that flares so often it is a real danger of derailing what should be a thrilling season for Klopp and his side.

One doesn't need a heat map to point out the bleeding obvious. Liverpool can't defend. They haven't kept a clean sheet all season and are without a shutout away from Anfield since February.

In four Premier league matches to date, they have conceded seven goals. Only Watford (eight), West Ham (nine), Sunderland (eight) and Stoke (10) look on at Liverpool's defensive record enviously. The 50 they conceded last season was the same as Watford, and two more than West Bromwich Albion. Leicester City were breached 36 times.

In six campaigns under Benitez's tutelage, Liverpool conceded just 183 goals, at a remarkable average of 30.5, according to stats from ESPN. That figure betters at least one of the top four in every season going back until 2007/08. A Liverpool side with Klopp's top half and Benitez's bottom would be an odd-shaped fella, but it would probably walk the league.

As an aside, Conte shares with Benitez a philosophy that all great teams are built from the back. In three years in charge of Juventus, his all-conquering side conceded just 101 goals in 151 matches. The Old Lady was so tight she owed herself a fiver.

This makes the signing of Luiz, a player famously prone to lapses of concentration, a little bewildering. Still, if Conte screaming blue murder in his direction can't minimize Luiz's occasional brain freezes, nothing will.

On the plus side, Luiz's passing range is beyond any of Conte's other options at centre-half, while his athleticism is another draw given John Terry is at the stage of his life where most people start to feel two days older with each passing morning.

That there forever seems a defensive calamity hiding around the corner for Liverpool is a crying shame, as some of the football they have played going forward has been museum quality. The goals they scored against Leicester were like a four-stick Kit Kat, each one as delicious as the last.

A cap doth to Klopp, too, for each of the goalscorers started the campaign with a point to prove. All three are sticking up a two-fingered salute to their critics, myself very much among them. Roberto Firmino and Adam Lallana have gone from being the extravagantly gifted but soft kids at school who were brilliant at five-a-side but useless at proper football, to being as incisive as a Stanley knife.

The former finished his brace against Leicester like a player already thinking of his celebration before he'd made contact—the hard part now a formality—while the goal Lallana hit was so sweet it's a wonder righteous troll celebrity chef Jamie Oliver didn't try to ban it. The only thing to say about Sadio Mane is he's looking a snip at £36 million. He really is.

The link-up between the three of them was as good as any attacking play seen this season, while the selfless Daniel Sturridge through the middle put in a never static shift that will have delighted Klopp. A rested Philippe Coutinho after international exertions will have told himself on the substitutes' bench it's the jet lag talking when concerns about having to win his place back ran through his head.

"It was a great game, attacking we were virtually perfect, so it was a great game that gives us confidence," said Coutinho to Liverpool's official website, placing particular emphasis on virtually.

Unfortunately, it takes more to winning silverware than being easy on the eye. A 2-0 defeat at Burnley despite bossing 81 per cent possession and having 26 shots was pure Keystone Cops stuff, while they did their level best to throw away a 4-1 lead at Arsenal.

A catalogue of injuries, along with poor form, has hardly helped. Klopp has been forced to select a different defence in every game this season. Against Leicester, two of his back four were midfielders. There remains a niggling doubt, though—despite Joel Matip looking an astute acquisition since coming in, and even with a full complement to choose from—that Liverpool will fall short at the back, in terms of having aspirations beyond qualifying for the UEFA Champions League.

Simon Mignolet hardly inspires confidence, with fit-again Loris Karius not short of supporters championing his cause for a start on Friday. Klopp likes his goalkeepers to act like sweepers, which is a shame, as Mignolet is about as useful with his feet as a chiropodist with a toe phobia.

Likewise, James Milner still has a lot to do to stop talk of why Klopp didn't buy a left-back in the transfer window being the most widely discussed topic in the pie queue at Anfield.

Liverpool's defence is not helped either by the absence of a first-rate holding midfield player in front of it. Captain Jordan Henderson has been charged with acting as a defensive screen, aided and abetted by Georginio Wijnaldum. It's not either of their natural games, though (to be fair, it's an answers-on-a-postcard job for what exactly is Henderson's natural game), and the pair can expect a long night chasing after Hazard, Willian and Oscar. The triumvirate has found a real coherence and fluidity so far under Conte.

Henderson is unlikely to be looking forward to inevitable comparisons with N’Golo Kante, already seemingly as important to Chelsea as he was to Leicester last season. The France international has even drawn some favourable comparisons with the previously unsurpassable Claude Makelele. It is no coincidence team-mates miraculously look twice as good in his presence, just as they did in his compatriot's playing days.

If Klopp can get Milner-Lovren-Matip-Nathaniel Clyne working together as a unit over a sustained period, there is the base there for a coherent and decent defence. Whether it could be anything more than that is open to debate.

Keeping a clean sheet against Chelsea and Costa would be a decent starter for 10.

All stats provided by WhoScored.com unless stated otherwise.