So Bruno and Wilson are out, Maxi probably too, and no one's got a clue whether Isak will be allowed to play or not. This doesn't bode well against a team who scored 9 in their last game.
I'd normally be expecting a battering, I still half am to be honest. They have their own injury troubles, but they've got a bit more depth to cope. Howe seems to have a knack of springing a surprise, we have plenty of fight under him, but I just think they'll have a bit much for us. 3-1 to Liverpool
Honestly, as a pool fan, I don't know what to expect. We have our own injury problems and whereas a lot of the injuries wouldn't be first picks anyway it means our bench has been filled with kids. Player like Milner and Henderson can't keep playing every game. They're too old (or at least too aged). I don't think it's too early in the season that tiredness from no available rotation to begin to be a minor issue. Darwin's red for his twattish headbutt is a major annoyance. Bournemouth was great result, but the last two times we won by 7+ goals we went on a run of really bad form immediately afterwards for a long stretch. I think the 9-0 was more Bournemouth bad than us being good, so I'm still nervous. Our first three games were terrible. I think of the two teams, we're more likely to win, but it won't be a hammering and it shouldn't be take as granted. More-over, I think teams have learnt how to play against our high-line now. It's no longer a tactic that is unknown and hard to beat. Crystal Palace are doing really well this year. They might be a tougher team to beat at the moment than we are. Bournemouth aside, we're in terrible form and Palace are in excellent form. You could get points against us, but lose them against Palace.
You'll be fine, we're only a few games in so the league table can't be relied on as a gauge for the full season just yet. You have plenty of quality. We are building up a decent 1st team, but a few of our key players are currently out and we really have no squad depth yet. The likes of Murphy still getting a look in says it all. I expect a Toon defeat by a couple of goals, but I just hope we still take the game to you like we have in other games recently, then who knows
We do have a lot of quality players. Maybe not as good as a few years ago, but still lots of talent. My worry is form. And it's not just for this season... It's stretching back to last season too. We didn't drop many points last spring, but we probably should have. Somehow we seemed to win even when playing badly. We started this season playing equally badly, but without the wins. Law of averages catching up on us... Can't always play badly and win. There's a general pattern to all our games though. We're better in the second half than the first. If you want to beat us, you have to hope to be ahead at half time. We're generally bad in first halves and good in second halves. No clue why.
Probably start on the bench, that's what Eddie seems to do with new signings. But would be nice to see him feature at some point.
