Liverpool’s imminent return to top four all the more impressive given absence of Sadio Mane

Graham Caygill looks at Liverpool's achievement of reaching the Premier League top four without their best player for large parts of the season.

Sadio Mane has missed large parts of Liverpool's season due to injury and international duty. Glyn Kirk / AFP

Victory over Middlesbrough on Sunday will see Liverpool finish in the Premier League top four and return to the Uefa Champions League for the first time since 2014.

It will be a big surprise if Liverpool do not get over the line, given they are playing an already-relegated side who have not won away since August.

However, Liverpool’s achievement is likely to be overshadowed as their place in the top four will deny Arsenal, who have been in the Champions League places every year since 1997.

And the fact Liverpool are set to return to Europe’s premium club competition following a season during which they have been without arguably their most important player, should not be underplayed.

Sadio Mane will be again sidelined on Sunday, meaning he will have missed 11 league games this season after undergoing knee surgery at the start of April.

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The Senegalese winger was absent in August for the away loss at Burnley with a shoulder injury, missed two league games while at the Africa Cup of Nations in January, and has been sidelined for the past seven games.

Mane was signed from Southampton last summer for £34 million (Dh162.6m) and despite not featuring for much of the campaign, still has to be a considered one of the signings of the season.

Particularly in the first half of the season, Liverpool were a joy to watch at times, with Mane linking up well with Roberto Firmino, Philippe Coutinho, Adam Lallana and Divock Origi to make one of the most formidable attacks in the league.

His movement across the forward line made him hard for opposition defences to pick up, and 13 goals and five assists in 27 league games is tangible proof of his impact.

“Luck” seems to be a word largely associated Jose Mourinho’s Manchester United, who have had plenty of injuries and failed to win games after dominating. But that is less about fortune and more about lacking quality in the final third.

Liverpool and Jurgen Klopp can rightly wonder what could have been if they had Mane for 36 games (he was always going to miss two games in January due to his Senegal commitments) rather than 27.

They averaged 2.14 points and 2.2 goals per game with him in the side, compared to 1.5 and 1.4 respectively without him.

Now, Liverpool’s leaky defence is as much a reason as Mane’s for their faltered title challenge, but it is hard to believe they would not be closer to champions Chelsea without the loss of one of the key cogs in their line-up.

Picture Chelsea losing Eden Hazard for 10 games of the campaign. Likewise Dele Alli at Tottenham Hotspur, or Alexis Sanchez at Arsenal.

It would have been a significant setback for each of those sides, so the fact that Liverpool are going to achieve the minimum they would have hoped for at the start of the season is worth acknowledging.

Klopp has a lot of work ahead this summer in sorting the weaker elements of his side, but the German can take a lot of encouragement from the prospect of what’s more to come if he has Mane for a full campaign next season.

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