Here’s our predicted Liverpool team to face Brighton at the weekend. The Reds will hope to continue their FA Cup campaign.
It’s back to the FA Cup on Sunday as Liverpool continue their defence of the trophy. Their fourth-round tie sees them up against Brighton – a side that outplayed them recently.
Jurgen Klopp has some big decisions to make, then. Will he try something new after the dull display against Chelsea? Was that dull display actually enough progress to keep the team the same?
Here’s what we think he’ll do.
Predicted Liverpool team vs Brighton
Defence
Yes, it’s the cup but we still think Alisson Becker will start in goal. We’re expecting the back four to change slightly with Trent Alexander-Arnold coming back in – other than that, it should remain the same.
Ibrahima Konaté and Joe Gomez have kept back-to-back clean sheets now and will surely continue. Andy Robertson has been one of the best Liverpool players this season and a near-certainty at left-back.
Midfield
We think Jordan Henderson will come back into the team for Naby Keita and alongside Thiago and Stefan Bajcetic here. John Aldridge called for the ‘fantastic’ captain’s return and it does make sense to us. Pressing Brighton as well as possible is the only way to stop them here.
And we’d stick with Bajcetic for that reason, too. He’s bringing far more energy to the side than Fabinho right now and the midfield does look more solid with him in it. Putting two very experienced players either side of him may help him along even further.
Attack
Mohamed Salah is a certainty on the right and we think Darwin Nunez comes back into a centre-forward role here. He made his return from the bench against Chelsea and it feels right to throw him back into the team.
That would see Cody Gakpo return to his best position out on the left flank. The £120k-a-week player deputised as a striker in recent weeks but didn’t look comfortable.
This should be a positive change for him.
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