Despite narrowly missing out on a trip to Wembley after crashing out of the League Cup earlier this week, Liverpool boss Brendan Rodgers has stuck by his objectives for the season: qualify for the Champions League and snag a piece of silverware.
With his side still alive in two cup competitions, there’s still hope that the Anfield outfit will be able to give Steven Gerrard one last trophy to lift before he leaves for the LA Galaxy in the summer. With the Europa League set to resume in February and an FA Cup fourth round replay with Championship side Bolton Wanderers just around the corner, there’s still lots of time to dream about winning cups, but if they want to achieve both of their goals their going to have to shift their focus back to the league real quick with West Ham United — a rival for a European spot — visiting Merseyside tomorrow.
With these two teams so close in the point’s race, these are the matches that really need to be won. After finishing last season in the wrong half of the table and with large swathes of the Boleyn Ground calling for the head of manager Sam Allardyce, the Hammers, along with high-flying Southampton, have done an about-face this term. A good start to the season has set them up nicely for the business end of the campaign, and though they remain rank outsiders for a Champions League spot, at this point there wouldn’t be too many surprised faces should they march on the continent next year.
That, though, is neither here nor now; before anyone starts booking flights, they’re going to have to start doing the business against the big-boys and that starts with a seriously tricky trip to Anfield. The Irons may have beat Liverpool like it was routine earlier in the season, but there’s no question that the side they’ll be facing tomorrow is vastly different from the one that capitulated in the capital. Couple that with the fact that their last away win against the Mersey Reds came before the term “Beatlemania” was coined and the enormity of the task really takes shape.
That being said, you can argue that the Irons have never been in better shape to end that wretched run of results than they are right now — off the back of two clean sheets and with the Reds playing 120-minutes of midweek, Allardyce has more than one thing to smile about. Midfielder Cheikhou Kouyate could be back in time after Senegal was knocked out of the Africa Cup of Nations and compatriot Diafra Sakho will make the grim trip up North in a limo, but the Hammers boss does have a few injury concerns in Alex Song, James Tomkins and Carl Jenkinson who are carrying knocks — still, at this time anyway, their respective injuries aren’t major and there remains the possibility of each of them popping up in the starting eleven alongside Reds old-boys Andy Carroll and Stewart Downing.
The Reds, on the other hand, may be without Mamadou Sakho after the defender was withdrawn just before the hour mark against Chelsea on Tuesday with a back problem. If the Frenchman is unable to make the starting eleven, it could be a big blow to Liverpool’s new found defensive stability, but that omission will be vastly over-shadowed should Daniel Sturridge make his way into the match-day squad. After spending the better part of the last five months on the sidelines, the striker’s return to the team will do nothing if not help his goal shy colleagues, though Saturday could be too soon for his impact to be felt — or for him to make the starting eleven.
What remains the more likely scenario is that Raheem Sterling will keep his central role from the get-go with the 25-year old to make a cameo appearance later in the day. Hopefully that will come with a lead already tacked on, but with the Reds finding the net only once in their last three outings, there’s no guarantee that’ll be the case. Of course, it hasn’t come with a lack of trying; Philippe Coutinho, Jordan Henderson and Alberto Moreno all had ample opportunities to punish Chelsea for the wastefulness at Stamford Bridge, but failed to take advantage. Maybe, at home and under only the tiniest amount of pressure less, they’ll fare a bit better.
Either way, through hook or crook, this one we’ll want to win. I thought that losing so thoroughly at the Boleyn Ground back in September was going to be the low point of the season, but we’ve been unfortunate enough to see worse performances from this side since then. Regardless, there’s nothing you can do about what happened before, you can only push on and make sure it doesn’t happen again. If there’s even an outside chance of us qualifying for the Champions League next year, we have to beat the teams that want the same thing; we don’t have a choice in the matter.
With the derby coming up next weekend, I’d rather be writing about how coming off the back of a win against a team as strong as West Ham not only sees us leapfrog them, but sets us up well for it. We’ve spent too much time this season trying to get back on track and failing miserably — let’s avoid doing that altogether and just stay there.
–Steven
