Liverpool star exposed after painful Arsenal display | OneFootball

Liverpool may have managed to edge out a draw against Arsenal on Thursday but that doesn't mean that they performed well.

The Anfield outfit may have kept Mikel Arteta's men at bay but that doesn't excuse their poor attacking performance.

Indeed, players such as Mohamed Salah, Alexander Isak and Hugo Ekitike are currently absent from Arne Slot's team so their attack is severely weakened.

However, the fact that they had zero shots on target is a massive cause for concern, especially since players such as Florian Wirtz and Cody Gakpo were on the pitch.

As mentioned, many of Liverpool's attackers aren't able to play for the club at the moment.

This means that those who are available need to prove that they have what it takes to plug the gaps when their teammates aren't around.

And, while some players stepped up, Gakpo wasn't one of them with the attacker putting in yet another lacklustre performance in their draw against Arsenal.

Although the Dutchman started the game as Liverpool's left-winger, he often drifted into the centre of the park and while he may have caused the odd problem or two for the Gunners, his finishing isn't good enough for him to be a striker.

Indeed, there have been times in the past when Gakpo has played well as a number nine but more often than not, he's let the team down.

Thursday's game was no different either with the attacker often falling at the final hurdle or when entering Arsenal's box.

Last term, he massively benefitted from Salah and Luis Diaz pushing ahead of him but, since the Reds don't have many options available to them at the moment, he's the one Arne Slot is turning towards to lead his attack.

It's clear that this isn't going to work with Thursday's outing further proving this.

Cody Gakpo's display vs Arsenal in numbers

One thing that has been made abundantly clear this season is that Slot favours certain players, even if they're not in good form.

Gakpo has been one of the Reds' worst-performing attackers this term but he's still started more games than most of his teammates.

And, as per Sofascore, his lack of form continued in their recent 0-0 draw with Arsenal on Thursday.

Despite playing an advanced role throughout the clash, Gakpo only managed to hit one shot towards David Raya.

Additionally, he only managed to maintain a pass accuracy of 77 per cent and he also failed to make any key passes.

Gakpo only had 42 touches of the ball despite staying on the pitch for the entire game with the Dutchman also losing possession of the ball 10 times.

Defensively, the winger was just as bad with the former PSV star only winning 44 per cent of his ground duels.

Not only do these statistics prove how poor he was against the Gunners but they also make questions about Slot's decision-making arise.

Here's hoping he can learn from his mistakes and improve over the next month or so.