Liverpool’s record with Wataru Endō is very impressive. Midfielders in other top Premier League sides can’t get close to matching arguably Jürgen Klopp’s key man.

Liverpool’s title credentials are being written off by some rival fans thanks to the Reds’ defensive record.

The issue is not so much with how many goals they conceded across the first 30 games — four more than Arsenal, one fewer than Manchester City — but with the underlying numbers.

With eight games to go, the Gunners had allowed just 20.8 expected goals (per FBRef), which put them comfortably ahead of City (29.0) and Liverpool (35.5).

Wataru Endō has made a huge impact in his first season with Liverpool (Image: Photo by Andrew Powell/Liverpool FC via Getty Images)

They have had the advantage of stability though. William Saliba and Gabriel Magalhães have started together 26 times, giving Arsenal a level of central defensive consistency of which the other two title contenders can only dream.

Defending is about far more than which men are stationed at the heart of a team’s back line though. Every player on the field has their off-ball duties and Wataru Endō can make a case to be the most important man in the 2023/24 Premier League when it comes to preventing goals being conceded.

FBRef carries data on how a team performs whenever a player is on the pitch, both in terms of actual goals for and against and also the underlying expected numbers. When the Reds have utilized the Japanese international, they have scored 27 goals and conceded just nine, giving Endō a goal difference of +1.37 per 90 minutes. This is 0.06 below the record Liverpool has when he has not featured, but the difference is negligible.

However, while his presence has enabled Jürgen Klopp to reap the benefits of playing Alexis Mac Allister in a more advanced role recently, Endō’s primary task is to prevent goals, and he is doing so very well. The Reds have conceded 0.93 goals per game in the league this term but just 0.68 per 90 when the former Stuttgart man has been involved.

It’s relatively rare for a Liverpool player to reach this level. Endō is the only man with at least as many minutes as he has played (13.2 per 90s) at this mark in 2023/24 and nobody reached it last season. In total, there have been 19 instances of 0.68 or better in the last seven campaigns, and 12 of them occurred in 2018/19, the defensive peak for Klopp’s Reds.

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The impressive comparisons don’t end there either. There are 236 players with at least 13.2 per 90s in the 2023/24 Premier League and Endō has the best pro-rata goals conceded record of any of them. Credit must also go to Joe Gomez, who is second in the standings with a 0.73 average despite playing multiple different roles for the team.

The next eight men in the standings all represent Arsenal, though interestingly if we lower our playing time bar to 11.6 per 90s, Diogo Jota is then in among them. Klopp’s ‘pressing monster’ has clearly been helping defensively as well as by scoring goals.

The best comparison points for Endō are defensive midfielders at top clubs, though, and he has an edge over Declan Rice (0.83 goals conceded per 90) and Rodri (0.89). While the margin is small and he has played most of the minutes, Arsenal has let in fewer goals per 90 without Rice compared with when he has played. He obviously has more of his career in front of him than the Liverpool number three but Rice’s $133m (£105m/€122m) transfer fee certainly makes Endō look like even more of a $21m (£16m/€19m) bargain.

Reds fans will hope he is available for the trip to face Manchester United. “We rested him today,” Klopp said after Liverpool’s 3-1 win over Sheffield United on Thursday night. “We had a feeling that he could’ve had a chance for tonight but if we leave him out there’s a big chance for Sunday. That hasn’t changed.” The numbers suggest the Reds’ defensive record will turn for the better when Endō returns and the reality of his transfer is now clear.

Liverpool.com says: When Liverpool was linked with Endō there was scepticism regarding his defensive and ground covered statistics as he was playing for a poor Bundesliga team. Yet he has proven those skills are transferable to a higher level. Whoever was behind the signing, the acquisition of Endō is another win for the Reds’ transfer process.