Would Daniel Sturridge turn out to be another expensive flop for Liverpool?

The arrival of Daniel Sturridge to Anfield from rivals Chelsea for a fee in the region of £12 million has not been met with an overflow of melodramatics amongst Liverpool supporters, jostling each other outside the Melwood training ground in pursuit of pictures amongst the scrim of photographers also queuing frantically to capture photos of the latest marquee signing. 

When watching him play it is thoroughly comprehensible why the acquisition of Sturridge has been met with a sense of unpledged affection from both Chelsea and Liverpool fans. Though his talent is undoubted, Sturridge has the frustrating tendency to mix his combination of amazing trickery and exceptional footwork with wayward long distance shooting and wasteful finishing, especially when a pass to a team-mate situated in a better position is on, much to the infuriation of his coaches, teammates and supporters, respectively.

 The signing of the Birmingham-born attacker signals the Reds' first foray into this month's transfer window but many of the club's most circumspect  followers are inevitably pondering the worth of the former Manchester City trainee. While Liverpool are in desperate need of more striking options to ease the Herculean task they have often been provided with by their talismanic forward Luis Suarez so far in this campaign, at £12 million, the purchase of Sturridge represents a sizable outlay of the funds supposedly afforded to the  manager, Brendan Rodger's budget. Therefore, it is only natural for fans to feel restrained over the transfer having witnessed the signings of overpriced British talents before. Andy Carroll, Stewart Downing and Jordan Henderson joined Liverpool within seven months of each other for a combined transfer fee of approximately £91 million, during Kenny Dalglish's ill-fated second reign at the club last season. All three have been disappointing so far, despite the recent improvement in performances from Downing and Henderson.  The Merseyside club simply do not need another profitless addition to the squad. 

Sturridge joins Liverpool with the same reputation as another underachiever who signed for the Reds, Ryan Babel. The latter was signed as a gifted 21-year-old from Ajax by Rafa Benitez for a similar cost of £11.5 million back in the summer of 2007. He was touted as the next Thierry Henry. Nonetheless, moments of brilliance from the Dutchman was repeatedly entwined with the needless squandering of ball possession, profligacy and a reluctance to work hard for the team, aspects often associated with Brendan Rodgers' latest recruit.

Liverpool could do without Sturridge overdoing intricate tricks, and speculative efforts from thirty yards when a pass to Luis Suarez or an onrushing Steven Gerrard is on. Nor do they want a squeamish individual in the starting eleven, who appears discouraged and uneager to complement the endeavour and industry so often characterised by the Uruguayan, as well as the captain Gerrard, midfielders Joe Allen, Lucas Leiva and the rising starlet Raheem Sterling. It was this absent-minded mannerism that prompted Roberto Di Matteo not to include the attacker in most of Chelsea's important fixtures that climaxed in FA Cup glory over the Reds and, most memorably, European glory in Munich last season. A team in which its success depended heavily on team effort and work rate.   

Sturridge made his league debut for Manchester City as an 18-year old substitute against Reading in February 2007, nearly six years ago. Since then, the striker's only period of consistent success in his career came when he was loaned out by the then Chelsea boss Carlo Ancelotti to Bolton Wanderers in the second half of the 2009-10 season where he managed eight goals in twelve games for Owen Coyle's side. Now at the age of 23, it is still hoped that comparable accomplishments are to be recounted. 

 In which position of the three attackers Rodgers intends to deploy Sturridge in the Northern Irishman's favoured 4-3-3 formation is anyone's guess. Having been deployed in the right of a front three during Andre Villas-Boas' short period in charge of Chelsea last season, where it finally seemed as though the forward was finally showing signs of maturing, Sturridge had amassed thirteen league goals in thirty appearances. So far this season, the forward has made fourteen appearances scoring a paltry two goals. This time last year he had featured in  twenty-two of Chelsea's games and had ten goals. It was the skill and his propensity to expect the unexpected that made Sturridge a constant menace, bamboozling full-backs with deft touches, flashy flicks and sublime step-overs. 

Despite the success Sturridge had sustained playing out wide, the striker, similar to his England international teammate Theo Walcott at Arsenal, has a preference of playing as the main striker. Rodgers has already refuted claims that Sturridge's contract states that he has to play through the middle insisting that no new signings will specify in what position they will play. While Sturridge certainly possesses the raw talent and is capable of playing in the central striking role, he does not necessarily boast the attributes needed to lead the line in the system Liverpool adopt. Sturridge, like the claims made about Walcott lacks the all-round footballing intelligence to play in a lone role in a 4-3-3 formation, in which your are required to create and score goals. His hold-up play and link-up play with the midfield can be found wanting as was apparent when playing for Great Britain in the Olympics last summer although he scored two goals in five appearances. Sturridge also lacks the ability to find clever space in the final third of the pitch in order to get himself into a decent position to score or incite centre-backs out of position by coming deep to collect the ball or moving into channels, subsequently enabling forward thinking midfielders to advance into the resultant free space. This is an area of the game in which very few can better Luis Suarez at.

The data in terms of the amount of goals and assists Sturridge has totalled thus far in his career in the Premier League gives an even more damning verdict in terms of the Englishman's inconsistency.

In the 21 league games he made as a Manchester City youngster, Sturridge scored five goals providing three assists. This meant that on average he scored 0.24 goals and set-up 0.14 during his time at Eastlands. During his three-and-a-half year stint with Chelsea, he appeared in 63 league fixtures, finishing with thirteen goals and seven assists in total, which equates to 0.21 goals a game and 0.11 assists. At Bolton, his most productive spell up to now, Sturridge netted eight in twelve games at an average of 0.75 a match. However, he failed to supply his teammates with any goals during his time on loan at the Reebok Stadium.

If these statistics were to even itself out over the course of a season, Sturridge would have scored ten goals, further contributing to his team's cause with four assists at an average rate of 0.27 goals per game and 0.1 assists over the same period too. These figures best applies to that of a flamboyant winger compared to that of a twenty-goal a season striker. It would also relieve some of the burden placed on Suarez too, compared to that of Stewart Downing who accumulated no goals or assists in the last campaign and Raheem Sterling, whom despite showing a lot of promise, is still far from the finished article.  

It is still hoped that Sturridge is to reach the peak of his powers. As we all know he is not a bad player despite the telling figures. In addition to his involvement in the England national team setup, at club level he has one Premier League honour, two FA cups- and most luminously a Champions League medal to his repertoire. The case could be made that if he was not from England, say he came from France, Italy or Brazil for instance, the assumption could be made that all the appeasement is the sign of a great player who has not entered the pinnacle stage of his career yet.

Realistically, for that to happen, his time at Anfield has to be a potent one. Upon the official announcement of his signing, Rodgers stated that "We are bringing in a player who knows he has to perform if he wants to be at one of the biggest clubs in the world and this is probably his last chance". This view was aptly reinforced by Steven Gerrard who conceded that Sturridge can have "no excuses" if he was not to execute his prodigious talent during his stay at the home of the five time European Cup winners. Manchester City and Chelsea had both signed Sturridge believing that it will only be a matter of time before he developed into the player everyone had once heralded him as. Now that he has joined Liverpool, it is imperative that he overcomes the disappointments of the past or risk becoming another expensive flop for Liverpool. Whether he has the mentality to succeed at the most decorated club in England and win over his staunch critics is another story.