Liverpool head to the Gtech Community Stadium on Saturday knowing that they are about to take on one of the Premier League’s toughest current assignments.

Brentford have built on a superb first season for manager Keith Andrews, in which they picked up four points from two matches against the Reds, and sit fourth in the Premier League table, unbeaten heading into the weekend.

Liverpool are sprinting harder than almost anyone

Part of Liverpool’s problem under Arne Slot last season was that they simply looked like they could not compete physically. That was the story when they visited the Gtech last season and came away with a 3-2 defeat.

Iraola was brought in, in part, to rectify that. The Spaniard likes his teams to play a high-energy style of football and according to stats collected by the Premier League, he has implemented that to a degree already.

The number of sprints a team makes per match is a good way of measuring their intensity levels, as it shows how often the players on the pitch are giving it everything across short distances.

Interestingly, Liverpool are averaging 127.3 sprints per match during their first six matches, which puts them as the second highest in the division, comfortably ahead of third-placed Newcastle (119 sprints per 90 minutes).

Sitting top are Brentford, who are only just ahead with an average of 127.5 sprints per match. With Andrews’ team easily over-running Tottenham and Chelsea – who sit 11th and 7th respectively on this list – already this season, the hope will be that the Reds can be their match.

Milos Kerkez is named in the top three of individual players with the most sprints per 90, sitting third behind fellow left-backs Leif Davis and Adrien Truffert, who takes top spot. Concerningly for Liverpool given their game on Saturday, two Brentford forwards – Igor Thiago and Kevin Schade – are in the top six, suggesting exactly what kind of game the Reds’ defenders are in for on this weekend.

However, sprinting more is obviously not a guarantee of any kind of success in the Premier League, as Manchester City are proving. Enzo Maresca’s team sit bottom here, but top of the table which matters, clocking up just 95.2 sprints per match.

Liverpool are still lagging behind on distance covered

Despite the improvement in the intensity with which his team are working, Liverpool do still have a problem with getting around the pitch in greater numbers.

Their total distance covered was used as a big stick to beat Slot with last year, with the Reds out-run by virtually every team they faced in 2025/26.

Although this had been expected to improve under Iraola, the uncomfortable truth is that things have not got better at all just yet.

The Reds actually sit dead last of the 20 Premier League teams in terms of average distance covered per match, racking up 109.5km across every 90 minutes. That is less than Slot’s team of last year so far, who were the second lowest in the Premier League, covering an average of 111.7km per game.

Ominously, Brentford are third on this particular list, racking up 117.6km each game. That’s just under their total of 116.3km last season, which was the seventh most in the division.

So, though Liverpool may be able to match the Bees for their intense running, they will clearly need to do it for longer periods, and run harder and faster, to get anything from Saturday’s game.