Liverpool travel to Austria on Wednesday to face LASK in the Champions League. All eyes will be on how the Reds react to their first defeat of the season following their 3-0 loss to Manchester City on Sunday.
The story of the season
The hosts have stalled a little over recent weeks. LASK are winless in four, losing three of those matches and drawing the other 3-3. This run includes their Champions League opener which ended in a 1-0 loss to AEK Athens in a game they did deserve to lose.
Away in Greece, the Austrian side managed to carve out an Expected Goals total of just 0.72. Bizarrely, prior to that defeat, scoring goals had not been a problem for Dietmar Kühbauer’s men. In their eight matches across all competitions preceding that Champions League clash, they’d scored a minimum of three in six of those outings.
This run included a 5-1 win over Celtic to knock the Scottish champions out of the Champions League play-offs. Despite their winless run, they’ve actually scored 19 goals in just eight league matches this term. They tend to be a threat going forward.
Liverpool’s unbeaten run across all competitions came to an abrupt end on Sunday as Manchester City ran out 3-0 winners at Anfield.
The Reds fielded a weakened XI with Cody Gakpo, Alexander Isak and Dominik Szoboszlai all ruled out. They initially did well before Ryan Gravenberch’s red card resulted in a collapse with the away side scoring three goals across a 15 minute period.
Prior to that, Liverpool hadn’t been that convincing but they’d been picking up wins. Andoni Iraola was trying to bed in a new system as well as fresh faces and he’d yet to strike a balance. He had, however, made the Reds a lot more resilient in the interim. They’d kept three clean sheets on the bounce in the Premier League before City ran riot. They’ve also managed to overturn a 1-0 deficit against Atlético Madrid in their Champions League opener.
Their bubble has now burst though and there’s going to be a big focus on how Iraola and his players react, especially given it’s a game they should be winning on Wednesday.
Key Players
Though he’s yet to score this season, a big player for LASK could well be former Wolves striker Saša Kalajdžić. He made his first start of the season for the Austrian side over the weekend and he completed 87 minutes. He had a decent international break, scoring and assisting for Austria. The 29-year-old is 6 ft 7 in and will cause issues for Virgil van Dijk and Jérémy Jacquet, despite their aerial dominance. The only question is whether or not the 29-cap international will start the game or whether he’ll be used as an impact sub. Regardless, he’s got the quality to change the game for the hosts.
For Liverpool, the focus will, once again, be on Florian Wirtz. He struggled against Manchester City and there are calls for him to be dropped. European football suits the German playmaker and it might be an ideal opportunity for him to play his way back into some sort of form for the Reds.
Team News
LASK are expected to be without Ramiz Harakaté but he would be the only absentee for the home side. Liverpool, meanwhile, are expected to still be without Isak, Gakpo and Szoboszlai for the trip. Hugo Ekitike, Giovanni Leoni and Conor Bradley are all definitely ruled out meaning Iraola’s hands are tied in some key positions.
Prediction
We’re going with a narrow 2-1 win for Liverpool, a Champions League confidence builder for a depleted Reds side.
(Cover image from IMAGO)
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