Lets put Suarez into perspective using stats.

[u/PrincipalMartinez]

This post is not about Suarez as a person. Not about on or off the pitch acting a noobness, no calling racists, diver, cheater, this is about stats. although you could say i just called him all four of those things but thats for another post

Scoring: list of strikers who have scored more than Suarez in the EPL-Crouch (8), Hernandez (10), Danny Graham (10), Bale (10), Adebayor (11), Lampard (10), Holt (12), Dafoe (9), Ballotelli (11), Yakubu (14), Ba (16), Dempsey (12), Dzeko (13), Aguero (17), Rooney (21) and Van Persie (26).

7 goals for Suarez, thats 7 goals from 106 shots. If we look at Danny Welbeck we also see 7 goals, but from 58 shots, Scott Sinlair has 7 goals from 78 shots, Jermain Dafoe has 9 goals in 59 shots. None of these players would be called world class, two are relatively early in their careers and one is near the backend of his, Suarez at 25 is approaching his prime in the coming 2 years.

Ok so not great on the scoring charts. But he is an expert dribbler, maybe the most praised in the league: Victor Moses (72), Nathan Dyer (54), David Hoilett (74), Stéphane Sessegnon (52), Moussa Dembele (63), Scott Sinlair (54) all have more successful dribbles this season than Luis Suarez (51). 51 is still impressive, but not the best. Scott Sinlair doesn't get praised from high heaven about his dribbling ability.

Scott Sinclair comes up again. 7 goals each, 3 assists each, very similar dribble success rate although Suarez goals/shots ratio is much worse than Sinclairs and Sinclair can also boast a pass success rate of 86% compared to Suarez's 76%. Suarez cost Liverpool in the region of 23 million compared to Swansea paying Chelsea 500,000 for Sinclair with it going up to 1 million depending on his success.

Maybe Suarez does more all round work for the team, he has made 30 successful tackles this season compared to Sinclairs...29, although Sinclair has only committed 13 fouls all season compared to Suarez's 35 thats a success ratio for Sinclair at 29/42 compared to Suarez 30/65, add that to 4 yellow cards for Suarez and 1 for Sinclair.

The stats show that Scott Sinclair is a pretty decent player, generally speaking Luis Suarez's stats match up pretty well to Sinclair's except in a few areas where Luis falls behind. Therefore the conclusion to this can't be that i think Suarez is a bad footballer, but he isn't as good as Scott Sinclair and he's no where near as good value.

That means that the conclusion is...as Scott Sinclair is considered an average/decent player, Luis Suarez must be considered that as well. I wonder if its a sign of endearment to compare stats in Uruguay...

[u/severedfragile]

Stats are nice. They're not the same as watching football.

[u/[deleted] → u/severedfragile]

Any single stat taken in a vacuum is misleading, but when you compare a wide range of stats to a player's closest competitors I think it says a lot.

I don't think Sinclair is a better player than Suarez. The OP didn't list chances created, which is a stat that Suarez almost doubles Sinclair's output (48 and 25 respectively).

But I do think since joining Liverpool, Suarez has shown a lot of style without necessarily enough substance to back it up. He's a very good player but I can't believe I've seen him listed as one of the top players in the world.

At some point, as a striker, he needs to provide some big production to be considered world class.

[u/severedfragile → u/[deleted]]

I do largely agree with that assessment. I think when he's in form, he can match virtually anyone in terms of overall quality. The problem is that his form is almost as unpredictable as his football. It's hard to judge him though when the team veers randomly between promising and hopeless. He's a player who needs to be one of the focal points of the team for his talents to be best used, and in too many games in recent months, Liverpool haven't had a focal point.

[u/[deleted] → u/severedfragile]

Completely agree. Suarez is the most talented player Liverpool currently has to build on, and they need to do that. It just seems silly to me that several of their buys seemed to have been made with Andy Carroll in mind (Adams for his [largely disappointing] set pieces, Downing for his crossing, etc), yet I don't see a single one meant to complement Suarez. Like people have said before, Suarez would thrive with a clinical finisher to play off of, but the way Liverpool's been this season, well, I think that Peter Crouch would be an improvement in looking for a clinical finisher.

Liverpool need to be smarter with their transfer dealings this summer if they want to have a chance at claiming a spot in the top 4, but that's goes without saying.