Crystal Palace vs Liverpool

BPL 2018-19 – Crystal Palace vs Liverpool Match Preview

First Monday Night Football of the Premier League season and what a game this shapes up to be! We have two very entertaining teams in Crystal Palace and title contending Liverpool meeting up at Selhurst Park! We will have a ton of great attacking talent on show including Zaha, Salah, Firmino, Mane, Benteke and many others. Palace have cause many problems for Liverpool over the years but this it the best Liverpool team they’re about to face in a long time. These are the games that make you a champion so can Liverpool show that winners mentality and overcome a tough away game or will Palace cause more problems for them? Let’s get into this preview deeper.

Crystal Palace

Crystal Palace started off the season carrying the momentum from the end of last season with a great away win against highly rated newcomers Fulham. Palace came out as 0-2 winners as they were very clinical. In that game, Fulham did control the game and did have more shots but Palace’s ruthless finishing and solidity all around gave them the great away win. Wilfred Zaha picked up from where he left off last season with a goal while Schlupp scored the other. Palace’s full backs Wan-Bissaka and van Aanholt proved to be the game changers as both made an impact going forward with an assist each. Benteke continued his struggles as he failed to get a goal in yet another Premier League game but it didn’t cost Palace.

Now that Palace got the opening game out of the way, they will now play the first home game of the season and what a test this will be with Liverpool coming to the city. Palace will have to deal with a team who looked unreal in the first game and defensively it’s going to be massively important that Palace are on it since Liverpool arguably have the best attacking trio in the world in Salah Mane and Firmino. Palace are going to need all of the defensive help that they can get from the CB’s, to full backs to midfielders, mainly Milivojevic and McArthur as they will have to really help out the centre backs, especially when the full backs bomb forward. Palace won’t back down, we know that they will have a go at Liverpool but it’s going to be very important to not leave themselves exposed at the back given the level of attack that Liverpool have. There may be moments where Palace will have to play defensive football which is not their style but they know that they can’t make it an end to end game for 90 minutes given the level of opposition. Zaha will have to put in a world class performance here if Palace want to win and the CDM’s, CB’s and Full Backs MUST BE aware of Liverpool’s attack at all times as mentioned already. In general, all around Palace have to really play a perfect game if they want to have a shot at winning.

Looking at team news, Roy Hogdson has confirmed that he has a fully fit squad to choose from so we may very well see the same lineup as we saw last week so there’s nothing much to report from that. Can’t expect much rotation after putting in a good shift last week as its best to just keep the winning side together.

Liverpool

It’s been everything that Liverpool fans have hyped up to be and then more in their opening game as their team lived up to the hype trashing West Ham 4-0 and leaving them no chance in the game. The attacking trio was already working magic as Mane got on the scoresheet twice, Salah scored one and Firmino got himself an assist. West Ham simply could not deal with Liverpool’s quick, deadly attack. One player that really stood out was the new signing Naby Keita. He literally slotted in perfectly into the squad as he was everywhere getting the ball back and driving it forward throughout the whole game. Defensively, Liverpool were left unthreatened and Alisson didn’t have much to do throughout the game in goal. It was just a phenomenal all around performance against a relatively decent side on paper by Liverpool and it has really sparked hope of winning the league.

Now, the test gets tougher for Liverpool, they face the in form Palace in their first away trip of the season. Now looking at recent meetings in Selhurst Park, Liverpool have had success playing here winning the previous 4 meetings in all high scoring affairs which ended 1-2 1-2 2-4 and 1-2. 1-2 is a very common score in this fixture. It’s really at Anfield where Palace have troubled Liverpool more funnily enough than at their own home. However, given that recent record Liverpool can’t come here thinking its going to be easy as Palace are carrying phenomenal form that carried on from last season, through this pre-season and into the opening game. Defensively, we will for sure see Liverpool tested more. Going forward, there isn’t much worry about this squad, they’re lethal and will more than likely score goals unless they’re on a bad day. It’s just simply going to be a very tough game for Liverpool and it’s the type of game that will show us whether they’re champion material or not.

In terms of team news, Liverpool have a pretty healthy squad except the fact that Lovren will miss his second straight game. Joel Matip could be back on the bench. We can expect Joe Gomez to slot in again alongside van Dijk at CB. It’s hard to expect many changes in the team, maybe Fabinho will get a start as he sat on the bench last week, but don’t expect Klopp to rotate much as the current squad are in phenomenal form and there really is no point to mess around with that. Liverpool will be coming into this game with a mindset to get all 3 points and put on a show again for their fans as Salah, Mane and Firmino look to destroy yet another opponent.

What to Expect

Goals, goals, goals is what we can expect. In the 11 previous meetings in all competitions which is since Palace got promoted there have been 10 over 2.5 goal games between the sides but if you’re a betting man the odds don’t hold much value and it’s best to go in between the 2.5 and 3.5 and with with a 3.0 goals over with money returns if the game only has 3 goals. This fixture tends to have a 2-1 result very often as 5 of those 11 meetings in a 2-1 win either way. Both teams to score is a good and over 2.5 could be another decent bet. Now let’s get into our prediction. Palace will be a testy side, it won’t be easy for Liverpool but we’ve seen what Liverpool can do in the opening game and it was brutally good. Palace are in great form, but now quite great like Liverpool who are just pouncing everyone right now. We expect Liverpool’s attack to shine as usual and they should dominate the midfield too. Most chances will fall for Liverpool, Palace will have a few of their own. Expect both teams to get on the scoresheet but essentially Liverpool will prove to be too much with their deadly attack. We’re going with a 2-4 Liverpool win as all 3 of Mane, Salah and Firmino to score, one of them will get a brace.

Match Odds (TonyBet)

Crystal Palace Win – 7.10

Draw – 5.00

Liverpool Win – 1.45

KICK OFF – 20th August 2018 – 8pm UK Time