Paul Merson believes that Arne Slot could spring a big surprise with one aspect of his starting XI for Liverpool’s clash against Aston Villa tonight.
In the Reds’ 4-0 win over Bayer Leverkusen in midweek, the head coach moved Luis Diaz into the centre-forward role to accommodate Cody Gakpo on the left, a decision which was well and truly vindicated by the Colombian scoring a hat-trick.
Despite the resounding success of that experiment, the Sky Sports pundit expects the 46-year-old to tweak things again for the visit of Unai Emery’s team to Anfield.
Merson expecting Liverpool selection surprise
In his weekly Premier League predictions column for Sportskeeda, Merson wrote that Villa could cause Liverpool plenty of ‘problems’, and he believes that Slot will rejig his forward line once more.
The pundit claimed: “Although Luis Diaz netted a hat-trick in the Champions League, I believe Darwin Nunez will return to the starting line-up for this game.”
(Photo by Alexander Hassenstein/Getty Images)
Surely Diaz won’t be dropped?
While Merson has anticipated a recall to the starting line-up for Nunez, which isn’t totally unfathomable, he didn’t specify whether that’d be in place of Diaz at centre-forward or whether the Colombian would be switched back to the left to allow for our number 9 to come back in, with Gakpo then dropping out.
It seems incomprehensible that the 27-year-old would be omitted after his hat-trick against Leverkusen, and it’d also be harsh on the Dutch forward to miss out after he too netted in midweek.
We suspect that the Uruguay striker might be the one to begin from the bench tonight, in the hope that he could make a decisive impact as a substitute if Liverpool are in need of goals in the final quarter of the match.
While Merson’s prediction might shock some Reds supporters, it also attests to the strength in depth that Slot has in attack, even with Diogo Jota and Federico Chiesa still sidelined through injury.
Jhon Duran has frequently been an impact sub for Villa this season, but we imagine that his compatriot Diaz will be on from the beginning at Anfield tonight.
