Another consequence that has often been mentioned since the injury issues took hold is the position of Trent Alexander-Arnold and Andy Robertson.
In the last two trophy-laden seasons both full-backs have often been the catalyst for devastating attacks, marauding down the wings at will to provide assist after assist with unrivalled accuracy and damage.
However, the assists appeared to have almost dried up with Alexander-Arnold providing just two in his 17 top flight appearances - until grabbing a third this season with a sumptous pass for Sadio Mane at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium - while Robertson has provided five in the last 20 games.
There were assumptions that because of the defensive issues Klopp's men are going through, both Alexander-Arnold and Robertson have dropped slightly deeper and the Reds are failing to create at the head of the pitch because of it.
It's a fair conclusion on the surface, but the ECHO set out to establish what has actually been going on with the two defenders in terms of their position by looking at heatmaps from every Premier League game so far this season.
As you can see from the set of heatmaps above, the position of Alexander-Arnold and Robertson is much like you would expect with the majority of their play coming on the wings in the opposition half.
These are the first five games of the season, before Van Dijk was injured against Everton.
Alexander-Arnold had provided one assist in the second-half against Arsenal while Robertson had two assists, against Leeds United and Everton, at this point of the campaign with the latter having also scored against the Gunners.
Now, something to note from these five heatmaps is that Robertson is playing further forward more often than Alexander-Arnold and appears to be getting into more penetrative spaces among the opposition defence while against Everton both players stayed a little bit further back which is understandable after the injury to their talisman in the heart of the backline.
This next set of heatmaps, which charts the position of Alexander-Arnold and Robertson in the three games before Joe Gomez suffered an injury on international duty, throws up some very interesting data.
As you can see, against Sheffield United and West Ham both players struggled to really get beyond the last line of defence as they started to get used to life without Van Dijk.
The duo regularly took up deeper positions than normal just beyond the half-way line, although there were clearly occasions when they took the decision to break forward as we have seen so regularly in past matches too.
Klopp employed a 4-2-3-1 formation against Sheffield United but it was back to the regular 4-3-3 for West Ham.
Against Manchester City - when Klopp employed his 4-2-3-1 formation for the second time this season thanks to the emergence of Diogo Jota - both Alexander-Arnold and Robertson had a tough time getting out from defence and you can see how much further back they were playing against a very high quality opposition.
Alexander-Arnold suffered a calf injury against City and was replaced on 63 minutes.
The first three of these heatmaps firstly show the position of Robertson, James Milner and Neco Williams after they filled in at right full-back while Alexander-Arnold recovered from injury before his reintroduction in the final 22 minutes against Wolves.
It is here where you can start to see how much onus has been put onto Robertson to keep driving forward and the rather lopsided nature in terms of positioning for Liverpool's full-backs in each match. In the game against Leicester, the Scotland international was by far the most advanced of either player and notched an assist for his efforts.
Against Brighton, Williams was taken off at half-time and replaced by Henderson while Milner dropped out of midfield and into right-back for the second 45 minutes, which seemed to be the right call from Klopp as the veteran's position is considerably more attacking than that of starlet Williams but it is still Robertson who covered an incredible amount of ground to get up and down.
The final two heatmaps here show Williams, Robertson and the re-introduction of Alexander Arnold but it was seemingly a tough ask for the latter to get forward after coming on and it was likely he was feeling his way back in after injury while Robertson continued to probe.
In these six heatmaps, highlighting the position of Alexander-Arnold and Robertson in the next six games of Liverpool's Premier League season, there are yet more interesting things to point out - and it is worth nothing that Diogo Jota had suffered an injury against Midtjylland in the Champions League before the trip to Fulham.
During that visit to Craven Cottage, it is clear both full-backs were playing high up the pitch but finding positions down the wings beyond the 18-yard box were a little more difficult to come by, again it was Robertson down the left who still found most success here.
Against Tottenham at Anfield, it was a slightly different story with much of the play continuing in the opposition half and both players driving beyond the defence and occasionally breaking into the penalty area with Robertson once more appearing to do this more effectively than Alexander-Arnold having provided an assist in the game.
Strangely, at Crystal Palace in the dominating 7-0 win both players appear to have assumed deeper positions than in the previous games but the Reds still managed to plunder goals and both defenders grabbed an assist that day.
And then comes the start of Liverpool's poor form with a draw at second-bottom West Brom, a stalemate at league strugglers Newcastle and defeat to mid-table Southampton.
Interestingly in all of those games, the lack of goalscoring is clearly not down to either the deeper position of Alexander-Arnold or Robertson, with both playing extremely high up the pitch and covering a lot of ground - though there is a drop off from the England international against Southampton. So, it is perhaps down to the aforementioned link-up play and chance creation during these games that is where the Reds started to fall down.
**You can read all about Liverpool's troubles in attack before they played Tottenham and where they came from here
The final three heatmaps here show the position of Alexander-Arnold and Robertson in Liverpool's last three Premier League games.
Firstly, against Manchester United both players got up and down the pitch well and broke beyond the defence occasionally too while also getting into the box at times although they were unable to break the deadlock.
When Burnley came to Anfield, both full-backs assumed positions so high up the pitch you'd think they were wingers and so much of their play came in the final third but still the Reds were unable to find the back of the net with both Robertson and Alexander-Arnold even further forward than they had been for the rest of the season.
During the trip to Tottenham it was much the same story for both players but their persistence in playing high and getting beyond the opposition defence finally paid off with the Reds dominating the game at the business end of the pitch and Alexander-Arnold getting a goal and providing an assist.
