Sportskeeda Football Awards 2014: Top 10 teams of the year

As the year 2014 comes to an end, we take a look back at the best teams from the top 5 leagues (EPL, Bundesliga, Serie A, La Liga and Ligue 1) from the past 12 months of football. The criterion for selection is not just winning trophies, but upsetting the natural order with a new brand of football. The usual suspects are all on the list – Real Madrid, Barcelona, Juventus, Bayern Munich – but there are a few surprises as well!On that note, here are the best teams of the year gone by:NOTE: The order of the teams has been decided using the Win% in the year 2014. The list is in descending order of Win% for all matches played by a team in the calendar year 2014.

#10 Liverpool

Competition Overview

EPL: 2nd place in 2013, 11th in 2014/15*

FA Cup: 5th Round in 2013/14

League Cup: 3rd Round in 2013/14, Semifinals in 2014/15*

Champions League: N/A in 2013/14, Group Stages in 2014/15

• * denotes ongoing competition

 

2014 Performance Review: Played: 47, Won: 27, Drawn: 8, Lost: 12

Overall Win%: 57.45

Top scorer: Daniel Sturridge (16)

• Liverpool make it to the list of top 10 teams by virtue of their stellar performance in the second half of the 2013/14 season i.e early 2014. The Reds went on spectacular run of 11 consecutive wins to almost snatch the EPL title from Man City’s grasp.

Under Brendan Rodgers’ management, Liverpool played arguably the best football in the EPL, and their attack-attack-attack mentality won them quite a few fans around the world. 

A disastrous start to the 2014/15 campaign has seen the Reds slip down to 11th in the table and get knocked out of the Champions League at the Group Stage itself.

To give you an idea of how badly the current season has affected them and how well they performed in the first half of 2014, here’s a stat – The Reds had a win% of 77.2 in the first half of 2014, second only to Juventus!