Meet Liverpool signing Kostas Tsimikas: The left-back to pressure Robertson

Liverpool wasted no time in seeking out a new left-back when it became clear that talks with Norwich over Jamal Lewis had broken down. The Reds had eyed up a move for the Canaries youngster last week as Jurgen Klopp sought to continue his raid of relegated clubs. 

The Reds couldn't agree a fee with Norwich for 22-year-old Lewis and swiftly turned their attention to Olympiacos left-back Kostas Tsimikas. Having failed in a £10m bid for Lewis, with Norwich believed to be holding out for at least double that, Liverpool quickly looked to the Greek defender and agreed a fee of just shy of £12m for Tsimikas. 

Head coach Jurgen Klopp believed cover for Andy Robertson at left-back to be a top priority this summer, particularly with James Milner's advancing years. The 34-year-old, a midfielder by trade, has been the only real alternative at left-back for Liverpool in the last two years, so a specialist in the role rather than the versatile Milner was understandably one of their first ports of call this summer. 

Robertson hasn't exactly been plagued by injuries during his time with Liverpool. Over the last two seasons, he has failed to start just six league matches, but Klopp is wary that a lack of competition for a starting spot could see the 26-year-old's performance levels dip. 

Tsimikas won't come in to immediately usurp Robertson, who is widely regarded as one of the best left-backs in world football, but he's a solid deputy that won't eat too much into Liverpool's summer budget. Indeed, the rumoured £10m Liverpool received from Zenit for Dejan Lovren last month will all but cover the cost of Tsimikas and while the Premier League champions are now a centre-back short, they will be stronger for having an additional, European experienced left-back in the squad. 

He is an attacking full-back who suits the approach implented by Klopp, whose Liverpool side has developed a statistically calculated WhoScored strength of 'attacking down the wings'. With Sadio Mane and Mohamed Salah looking to both cut infield from the left and right, respectively, there is huge onus on Robertson and Trent Alexander-Arnold to help stretch opponents from their flank and it's an approach that worked given Liverpool's title success and the full-back's respective assist totals of 12 and 13 in the Premier League last season.

The Greek left-back is comfortable enough bombarding forward to support the offensive having completed 14 dribbles in the group stages of the Champions League this season; no defender made more, despite being drawn into a group containing Bayern Munich and Tottenham. Impressively, still, is that of those to attempt 20 or more dribbles across both the Champions League and Europa League this season, only Alphonso Davies (76%) has returned a better dribble success rate than Tsimikas (70.8%) of all defenders, that in itself the 26th best of the 118 players who meet the criteria at the time of writing. 

By comparison, Robertson returned a dribble success rate of 33.3% having been successful with just three of his nine attempted dribbles in the Champions League this season, though the lowly dribble return is largely due to the fact he was already so far forward and with ample space when he did receive the ball, so he rarely needed to beat an opponent. Yet, even when tasked with getting the better of any opposition, Robertson still struggled where Tsimikas thrived. 

What's crucial, too, has been Tsimikas' end product. Granted, he has just one assist to his name from his 10 European outings across the Campions League and Europa League, but an average of 1.3 key passes per game was higher than Robertson (0.8). The Greek defender also boasted a better cross success rate (41.5%) from 41 attempted crosses than Robertson (23.1%) from 39 attempted crosses. 

Off the ball, too, Tsimikas is no slouch as evidenced in his 56 tackles and interceptions combined, that enough to rank fourth in both of Europe's club competitions this season, as the left-back works tirelessly out of possession to the benefit of his team. It's this work-rate that has appealed to Klopp and will sit well with Liverpool fans. As far as cost-effective deputies that tick all the boxes go, Liverpool couldn't really ask for better than Tsimikas 

With a WhoScored rating of 7.17 better than any other Olympiacos player in European competition, his exit will be a loss for the Greek side, but in Tsimikas, Liverpool will be acquiring a highly competent left-back for around the same fee they recieved for Lovren, which can only be a good thing for the Merseysiders.