Looking at the style of play, you’d have to say Liverpool are much improved under Jurgen Klopp. They are faster and more confident, seemingly full of endless energy when chasing the ball. They never give up, fighting for results till the end. Flipping by, and paying no attention to the score, it always seems like the team is just a moment away from breaking loose, from turning into a top side again.

Yet, looked at with a more dispassionate eye, there’s not been that much improvement around Anfield this season. Despite Klopp’s promise, the new manager has not yet delivered.

That might seem an outrageous claim on the surface, but simply look at the numbers. Brendan Rodgers lost his job for going 3-3-2 at the beginning of the season. That’s a total of 12 points out a possible 24, clearly not good enough for a team with ambitions — realistic or not — of playing in the Champions League. But Klopp has actually done worse since he arrived. His record is 6-4-6, which is 22 out of 54 possible points.

With the loss today, Liverpool drop down to eighth in the table, only two spots higher than Rodgers had them. And they may fall another tomorrow should Wigan beat Chelsea. It’s hardly the start that might be expected from a manager who was treated like a savior when he arrived.

Now, caveats are of course necessary here. This is not Klopp’s team. He inherited an under-performing side and has at least injected some passion and belief in them. That’s not nothing. And it won’t be fair to really judge him until after he’s had at least a summer to go out and buy players he considers worthing of donning the Liverpool red.

There may be something as well in the particularly fierce competition this season, in the underperformance of all the big clubs, of the big names who have refused to go anywhere near the Premier League recently.

But there’s reason to believe that Klopp might not be all his reputation suggests. Consider his tenure at Borussia Dortmund.

Normally, this is the highest recommendation for the man. He won the Bundesliga twice and the German Super Cup twice as well. He won the DFB-Pokal once and was runner-up twice. His team was also runner-up in the Champions League a few years ago. But for all that success, his career is not that different from Rodgers.

After all, Rodgers was only a success so long as he had Luis Suarez in the teamsheet. As soon as his prize player moved on to Barcelona, he couldn’t manage much out of the side. The same can be said for Klopp, whose successful stint at Dortmund coincided neatly with the term of one Robert Lewandowski. The only piece of silverware Klopp won without his master goal scorer was the 2014 German Super Cup on day one of the post-Lewandowski period, a rather dinky trophy compared to the previous heights of the club. After that, it was downhill. In Klopp’s final season with Dortmund, his team had to fight off relegation, clawing their way to seventh.

The lows under Brendan Rodgers were never that low.

Of course, there’s much to be said for the improved atmosphere at Anfield, the sense hope, and the reputation that might inspire a few bigger names to give the team a second look. Perhaps Klopp can level-out the results by the end of the season and turn an average team into a phenomenal one. He may yet prove to be as big as his reputation, that his last season at Dortmund was a blip and not a warning.

But all the same, Liverpool fans should beware too much faith in their new German import. Though the dressing is quite different, they may in fact have exchanged like for like in the management spot.