Liverpool host Fulham at Anfield in the first leg of their 2023-24 Carabao Cup semi-final.
Victory would put Liverpool on the cusp of a 14th League Cup Final appearance going into the second leg, whilst Fulham chase a first appearance in the final of this competition.
Team News
Virgil van Dijk could return for Liverpool after he missed their FA Cup win at Arsenal due to illness.
Trent Alexander-Arnold however is ruled out aftr he suffered a knee injury during the victory in North London.
Ben Doak (knee), Konstantinos Tsimikas, Andrew Robertson (both shoulder), Joel Matip (ACL), Stefan Bajcetic (calf), Thiago Alcantara (hip), Dominik Szoboszlai (hamstring), Wataru Endo and Mohamed Salah (both international) remain absent.
Fulham have no fresh injury concerns to report after their FA Cup win at home to Rotherham.
Tim Ream (calf), Adama Traore (hamstring), Fode Ballo-Toure, Calvin Bassey and Alex Iwobi (all international) remain absent.
When is Kick-Off?
Liverpool host Fulham at Anfield on Wednesday 10 January in a 8pm GMT kick-off, live on Sky Sports in the UK.
Stat Attack
- Liverpool have avoided defeat in all nine meetings against Fulham across five separate League Cup ties (W7, D2).
- Fulham are winless in their last five League Cup trips to Anfield (D1, L4).
- Liverpool have scored 21 goals and conceded just one goal in their last four League Cup meetings at home to Fulham (W4).
- Cody Gakpo has scored in all three of his Carabao Cup appearances for Liverpool this season (W3).
- Fulham have failed to keep a clean sheet in their last five matches in this competition (W2, D2, L1).
Prediction
With their winter break coming up aftr this match, Liverpool certainly won’t want to lose this game but they must be more clinical than they were at Arsenal because they were pretty wasteful amidst some resilient defending which proved key to that win.
Fulham meanwhile had almost 45 hours additional hours of rest due to having beaten Rotherham on Friday evening, although they will need to step up their clinical end product because this is a tie where they must nail every aspect of their game if want any chance of winning the tie over two legs.
Marco Silva’s Cottagers however have won just twice on the road in all competitions this season but came close to a draw in their league visit here last month, so their best hope will be to dig deep defensively and snatch a draw to take into their home leg.
I however just can’t see Liverpool losing this game especially on their home turf even despite having less rest time than Fulham.
Prediction: Liverpool 2-1 Fulham
Result: Liverpool 2-1 Fulham
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