Football.ua<\/a> | Wikipedia)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nWith Milner no doubt running players 15 years his junior ragged on the south coast, the likes of Robertson, Jordan Henderson and other super-fit members of the Liverpool squad would have been hoping to claim his crown. In the end, though, it was Salah who was reportedly the fittest \u2013 as measured by this particular test.<\/p>\n
Due to the nature of the test, only a small number of players can take it at any one time. In the first batch of players, Salah was up against Robertson, Henderson, Ibrahima Konate, Conor Bradley, Virgil van Dijk and full back Kostas Tsimikas. In the end, youngster Bradley and Henderson made the podium but it was Salah who came out on top.<\/p>\n
In another heat, Liverpool\u2019s new midfield signing, Dominik Szoboszlai finished ahead of Luis Diaz and Cody Gakpo. With Szoboszlai charged with bringing new energy to the midfield, that was an encouraging sign but in the end, it was Salah, aged 31, who was adjudged to have come out on top.<\/p>\n
Does That Mean Salah Is the Fittest?<\/h2>\n
As said, \u201cfitness\u201d can mean many different things and despite Salah\u2019s impressive upper body strength and physique, we doubt he could match VVD or Konate (who both did poorly in the lactate test) when it comes to the bench press. Salah may or may not be the fastest player in the Reds\u2019 squad, with this another possible definition of fittest. That said, Darwin Nunez was the fastest of the group according to official Premier League records for 2022\/23, clocking in at 36.53km\/h. Kyle Walker was the fastest recorded last term at a speedy 37.31km\/h.<\/p>\n
There are clear distinctions between fittest, strongest and fastest, of course, but a broader view of what constitutes the former would probably include at least some elements of the other two. Ultimately, the person with the best lactate performance simply has\u2026 you\u2019ve guessed it: the best lactate performance. There are other methods of measuring fitness from an endurance perspective, including VO2 max and the less well-known use of fractional exhaled nitric oxide testing, or FeNO.<\/p>\n
In addition, any baseline measure of aerobic fitness is useless unless the player in question has the mental capacity to push themselves to that physical limit. Milner was certainly one person who could do that and Salah also possesses an exceptional work rate, pressing from the front in a way that has been central to Liverpool\u2019s success. That new boy Szoboszlai won his heat ahead of Luis Diaz and Gakpo bodes well and no matter who the new James Milner is, we just hope that a re-energised Liverpool can have a much better season than they managed in 2022\/23!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Liverpool\u2019s high-energy, rock-and-roll football, with its emphasis on pressing, counter-pressing and counterattack demands extremely fit footballers. The ability to make a large number of high-intensity sprints and to keep doing that for 90 minutes, and extra time if required, is a big part of being a Liverpool player under J\u00fcrgen Klopp. The demands are not … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":576,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_FSMCFIC_featured_image_caption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_nocaption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_hide":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfcbetting.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfcbetting.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfcbetting.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfcbetting.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfcbetting.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=572"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfcbetting.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":575,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfcbetting.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572\/revisions\/575"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfcbetting.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/576"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfcbetting.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfcbetting.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfcbetting.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}