Ranking Liverpool's Starting XI From Real Madrid Defeat

10. Joe Allen

If there is one Liverpool player who divides a lot of opinion, it's Allen. Some see him as a tactically-astute player who does lots of understated, effective work in midfield, while others see him as a fraud who simply gets into the team by having good passing accuracy statistics. Realistically, the 24-year-old is somewhere in between. He can be effective, but he must do more. The Wales international worked extremely hard throughout against Carlo Ancelotti's side, pressing the wonderfully metronomic Madrid duo of Luka Modric and Toni Kroos to good effect, but his use of the ball was not good enough. Too often he was robbed of possession, and physically he looked lightweight. It would be foolish to write Allen off- remember how knee-jerk we were about Jordan Henderson- but there can be no doubting that improvements are needed if he is to become a regular at Anfield.