Diogo Jota Names Arsenal Star And 2 Ex-Chelsea Players As His ‘Toughest’ Opponents

Liverpool forward Diogo Jota has named three defenders as the toughest opponents he has faced in his professional career.

The Portuguese international has spent seven and a half seasons playing in the English top-flight for Wolves and Liverpool and, asked by ESPN who he has had the most trouble playing against, Jota replied:

“I’ll go (Antonio) Rudiger, (William) Saliba maybe, and Thiago Silva. (What’s tough about them is) Thiago Silva is very smart, Saliba is just a mix of smart and powerful and Rudiger is very aggressive.”

Jota came up against Rudiger during his time at Chelsea and Real Madrid, while Silva was also at the Blues before leaving for Fluminense last year. Saliba, of course, is marshalling Arsenal‘s backline.

The Liverpool striker is pretty deadly against any defence

Even though he cites Saliba as a tough opponent, Jota has actually scored plenty of times against the Gunners – 8 goals in 15 appearances. There is just one other opponent (Leicester – 9)  he has scored more against.

In fact, the 28-year-old rarely faces a defence that gets the better of him. He has only failed to score against three teams in the Premier League – Aston Villa, Huddersfield & Luton and he only faced the latter two clubs three times in total. He didn’t find the back of the net against Liverpool either when he was at Wolves.

When will Jota return from injury?

No Reds fan would question the striker’s ability but his fitness record in recent years is pretty poor. After scoring within seconds after coming on versus Nottingham Forest a couple of weeks ago, he returned to the treatment table.

Jota is believed to be suffering with a muscular injury but head coach Arne Slot has not provided an estimate as to when he will return to action – only saying it will be “weeks” rather than months.

Find out who is in Liverpool’s first-team squad for 2024/2025 season here

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David Tully

David Tully

David has worked as a football reporter for the last fifteen years. Having started as an intern at Snack Media, he then went on to become a freelancer, working on various different sites. At the start of 2023, he took up his current role as content writer for National World's Football News Network.