Time to put the Brighton game behind us as another proper European night returns at Anfield. Having won on their turf, the reds need another win now against Atletico at Anfield to ensure we are through to the round of 16. We can then hopefully rotate our key players for the remaining 2 group games.
Atletico Madrid have lost just once in their last six away trips to face English opponents in European competition (W2 D3), however that defeat did come in their most recent one – a 2-0 defeat to Chelsea in the Round of 16 last season.
Atletico’s recent form isn’t as good as ours, having drawn two in the previous 5 games against Real Sociedad and Levante.
Last 5 games:
Liverpool - DWWWW
Atletico - WDDLW
If Fabinho is fit, expecting him to return in the line-up along with Hendo in the midfield. I would also prefer Matip, Tsimikas and Jota instead of Konate, Robertson and Bobby for this game.
Alisson; Trent, Matip, VVD, Tsimikas; Fabinho, Hendo, Jones; Salah, Jota, Mane
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AM are not coming to party and do expect them to make a game of it.
After the shambles that was the Brighton game we need to field the best side,which of course Klopp will from the available players.
As I don’t expect to see that shite again this season we should win but it wont be easy.
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This was never going to be a walk in the park even if Klopp had a full compliment of midfielders to choose from.
If he only has the three that featured against Brighton, it’s hard to see how we avoid defeat, especially with the way we’ve been defending.
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If the whole team steps about 2 steps up compared to Saturday 1-1, if not 1-3.
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I imagine this will be very tricky, fingers crossed we can see Fab and Thiago at some point but I doubt either will start. Atletico really need to go for the win combine that with our likely attacking midfield and this could end up being a very open game.
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This is one game where I wish we had it in us to just shut up shop and play on the break.
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Well perhaps Atletico, and that mad man in charge, forces us to do so … yeah right, they park the bus and want to beat us at the break.
They have an excellent midfield, much better than our lightweight midfield with Henderson, Jones and Ox. I fear the worse.
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Hopefully there’s been an internal inquiry after Saturday’s game. We can’t carry on playing on the edge like this all season. At some point we’ll get an absolute bumming unless we tighten up. JK’s assessment of Fabinho’s injury being complicated suggests he won’t be playing any time soon. Surely Thiago will at least be on the bench. Otherwise it’s the same midfield 3 as we don’t have any other alternatives. Poor Curtis looked cooked on Saturday. I don’t blame Klopp for sticking with Konate for the Brighton game as he did so well against United but his inexperience showed on Saturday and I’m guessing Matip is back in for this one. Jota for Bobby.
I have never got the Atletico game from 2020 out of my system. It was a travesty we lost that night. I’m thinking this might be a good game for us to have right now. Big CL night against shithouse opponents should bring the best out of everyone including the crowd.
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I would consider playing Matip at 6 if Fabinho is still out. He has the football in him and offers more defensive wise than Hendo.
Hendo and whoever is fit ahead of him.
Konate based on Man Utd, not Brighton to partner VVD.
I agree with Robbo being rested abd Tsimikas can cover.
Up front Bobby to keep his place, Jota on the bench.
Tough match but fuck it, you have to face tough opposition at this level.
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We’ll see what we do at CB, it’s more of an open question now with some recent individual performances, type of opponents and tight schedule.
Hopefully Fabinho is good to return, though you couldn’t tell pre-Brighton how long he could be out for. I consider Keita out, it sounded like that from Klopp after the game. Thiago probably needs more training time now, maybe he can make the bench. Hopefully this is all not too much football for Jones and this is also now a little opportunity for Ox. We’ll know more tomorrow.
The alternative if we’re a bit short and need to be more compact is to flip to the 4-2-3-1, play maybe a double pivot of Hendo and Jones with Bobby in front of them. And then either Jota or Mane on the right.
Atletico are always a challenge in top games even when their league results against some smaller sides aren’t great, so I expect nothing else than another gritty approach from them.
We are certainly going to have to be more compact in MF than we were on Sat. When we signed Konate I though I read that he had played CM occasionally. Could be an option if so.
Konate has never played anywhere other than CB. Maybe you’re thinking of Matip?
Could be. Whatever, we could really do with beefing up our MF for this one and maybe Matip at CM would be a good option. We have some tough games coming up and none of the currently injured mid fielders look likely to be fit for a week or so.
Defence and forwards are easy to select as we have no fitness issues.
The defence however does need to sort itself out, or the combination of defence and midfield needs to sort themselves out. If no Fab then the defence will need to change how they play, just slightly.
The only questions are in midfield. I don’t even know who is fit. The same midfield of Hendo, Ox and Jones is a disaster in current form. It would be nice to have at least one of Ox or Jones not on the field, preferably Jones due to last performance.
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Given we won at AM week before last, not losing to them this week would do me fine, especially with the mini midfield crisis we have going on.
Ofcourse, I’d rather we win this (and we owe them one too) rendering the remaining two games as ones for heavy rotation.
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Just a thought, I wouldn’t mind playing Bobby/Mane instead of Curtis/Ox in the midfield. I feel Takumi might start, he looked hungry, feisty, when he came against Brighton.
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I think we should play with an extra midfielder in this game, with Salah and Mane or Salah and Jota up front.
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Whoever plays, I hope we start fast and high intensity, get a goal and then manage the team. That would be perfect progress and bold well for the season.
Crowd needs to pull their finger out as well.
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We basically never really saw one of our CB’s under Klopp play in midfield. We did the Gomez at RB and Trent in midfield shift once, against Stoke at home 0-0 in 2018. There are more chances of simply a change in structure to the 4-4-2. We’ll just have to stick together and find a way in these next two games before the break. We’ll know more when Klopp speaks tomorrow.
We saw one play directly as a striker! 
