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The Premier League’s top two sides are both involved as part of a rare Saturday evening televised double-header, as Liverpool v Aston Villa slots in at 8pm following Manchester City’s trip to Brighton.
Arne Slot’s wonderful start to life at Liverpool got even better on Tuesday as the Reds thrashed Bundesliga champions Bayer Leverkusen 4-0.
They showcased two distinct sides to their game on the night. The first half was not particularly easy on the eye but Liverpool controlled the game out of possession. In the second period, they picked their opponents apart with some stunning passing from Curtis Jones and Mohamed Salah, helping Luis Diaz take home the match ball.
That came off the back of an ideal Saturday domestically, as they came from behind to beat Brighton & Hove Albion, capitalising on Man City and Arsenal dropping points.
It has been a challenging time for Aston Villa, who have exited the Carabao Cup, dropped out of the Premier League top four, and suffered a costly defeat in the Champions League in the space of a week.
The bizarre circumstances in which they conceded the penalty in Bruges on Wednesday will only make them feel worse about the fact that they have gone from having a perfect record in the competition to now clinging on to a place in the top eight by a point.
Unai Emery called on his team to be ‘more intelligent’ after the 4-1 defeat by Tottenham Hotspur last weekend. They also need Ollie Watkins to rediscover his goalscoring form - he has netted just once since the start of October.
Saturday marks Aston Villa’s 100th visit to Anfield, and they will hope for a turnaround in fortunes at a stadium where they are winless over the last decade.
The Reds have won five and drawn one of the last six meetings on Merseyside, with the latest of those victories coming in September 2023 as Dominik Szoboszlai and Mohamed Salah each scored in a 3-0 win.
Villa haven’t been without their success against Liverpool, though. They triumphed three times at Anfield between 2009 and 2014, but even more memorable was their 7-2 mauling of the then-champions in 2020 at Villa Park.
Liverpool are the form team not just in terms of recent results, but the latest H2Hs as well.
They will also have had an extra day’s rest and were at home in the Champions League while Villa travelled to Belgium.
The visitors may struggle to breach the Reds’ defence, but they have done so emphatically on a couple of occasions in the last five years.
It is not always easy to predict whether Slot will select Diaz or Cody Gakpo on the left of his front three. But after his midweek hat-trick, Diaz has made himself undroppable, and the best bet is for him to score first.
Sadio Mane used to be an expert at scoring openers for Liverpool. Diaz had half a season to bed in on Merseyside before Mane departed, but Reds fans can feel like they now have a genuine replacement for the Senegalese attacker.
The one criticism often aimed at Diaz before this season was that he didn’t find the net enough. With nine goals in 15 appearances this term, those concerns seem to have been put to bed.
Diaz struck first against Leverkusen having already done the same against Bournemouth, Manchester United, and Brentford this season. He played most of the game on Tuesday through the middle and it worked a treat for Slot. A repeat of that tactic will only increase the value of our first goalscorer selection.
It perhaps took Diaz some time to get back to his best after a knee injury wrecked most of his 2022-23 campaign. The Colombian is enjoying his best-ever form for Liverpool now, and his name can be added to the list of contracts the club needs to sort.
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