Liverpool travel to Arsenal on Sunday to begin their battle on four fronts going into the second half of the season. The FA Cup tie at the Emirates is the first of five games in 25 days but that could rise to six or seven if a replay is required – something no one wants as modern football does its best to eat itself – and Liverpool reach the fourth round.
They sit atop the Premier League, the trophy they most want to win, after 20 matches. It will be the focus for the remaining months of the season. Naturally, Liverpool want to win the Carabao Cup, FA Cup and Europa League, too, but the sustainability of challenging in four competitions is problematic.
In 2021-22, Liverpool played 63 games as they won the FA Cup and League Cup, while finishing runners-up in the Premier League and Champions League. “We were on the edge. It was good fun, but it was super intense,” Jürgen Klopp says.
“The problem for us was that you cannot wait to plan a pre-season after the last match day. You plan a pre-season for the summer in the previous October. You don’t know if you’re going to be playing in the Champions League final very late in the season. So then you play the Champions League final and not long after you fly to Bangkok. Then you play Man United on the third day of pre-season, lose 5-0 and lose two players.
“We try to find moments where we can prepare the boys for a super-intense season. But the people who decide don’t care about that. There isn’t one guy deciding who can remember what it was like when he was a player – if he ever was a player. That’s how it is. I won’t be in there deciding and I won’t have the power for that.”
What impact the exertions of 2021-22 had on the next season are difficult to quantify but Liverpool won three of their opening eight league fixtures. Klopp has to look at the bigger picture beyond the next five months because he has an array of valuable assets contracted for years to come that need managing carefully for the good of the individual and club. It is a tricky balance for Klopp, who is aiming to maintain momentum. “Rhythm is an important thing,” he says. “For Arsenal, we will go all in.”
Liverpool are 29 matches into the season and potentially have a further 36, if they reach three finals, via two possible FA Cup replays. Darwin Núñez, Liverpool’s most used player, has featured 34 times for club and country, including nine matches between 3 December and 1 January. Between 20 June and 14 July the Uruguayan has the prospect of the Copa América, the final is the same day as the Euro 2024 climax and theoretically could be Núñez’s 68th outing, but players should not worry too much because the powers that be have allowed another month before the opening weekend of the Premier League season. Use the time wisely, lads.
“We came out of a period where we played five games in 13 days and nobody asked us: ‘How did that feel?’” Klopp says. “We just have to go through and win. That is how the world is. Now we have two games in three days and that sounds like the world will end. Where is the problem? That is our life and the life of the boys. We have to make sure we get through.”
Liverpool face Fulham in the first leg of the Carabao Cup semi-final on Wednesday as the stakes increase. The squad has been weakened after Mohamed Salah and Wataru Endo departed for the Africa Cup of Nations and Asian Cup, respectively. Dominik Szoboszlai will miss the trip to Arsenal with a hamstring problem, while Joël Matip, Stefan Bajcetic and Thiago Alcântara remain sidelined.
Klopp is without his first choice left-backs Andy Robertson and Kostas Tsimikas, forcing Owen Beck to be recalled from Dundee. The squad is deep but has limitations and it is likely fringe players will play against Arsenal.
Liverpool will, at least, be spared partaking in the ludicrous 2025 Club World Cup concept. “I don’t know how to compare that to anything else, where you take time off away from your best employees and then just think: ‘They will go again and play a full season,’” Klopp says.
There is only so long players can keep playing at their limits and, as Klopp says: “At some point, someone will have to press the brake.” Liverpool will not want to go out of the FA Cup, especially to a title rival, but it could help them slow down to speed up when it matters.
