Reaching a cup final is always something to cherish, but Liverpool doing so on Thursday night has come with a bit of a catch for the Reds.
Arne Slot’s side emphatically overturned their 1-0 deficit from the first leg of their Carabao Cup semi-final against Tottenham by thrashing the north Londoners 4-0 at Anfield, thus securing their place in the showpiece at Wembley next month.
Newcastle stand in the way of LFC winning the competition for the third time in four years, with the first trophy of the English season up for grabs on 16 March.
Liverpool had been due to play Aston Villa in the Premier League the previous day, but that fixture will obviously move as a result of our progress to the Carabao Cup final – and a date has already been added to the diary for the visit to the Midlands.
Liverpool now face February fixture pile-up
The Reds take on Unai Emery’s side on Wednesday 19 February with a 7:30pm kick-off, with that rescheduling now leaving Slot’s team with five top-flight fixtures in the space of just 15 days this month.
The pile-up begins with the Merseyside derby at Goodison Park next Wednesday before a home clash against Wolves on Sunday 16th. Then there’s an away double header against Aston Villa and, on Sunday 23rd, Manchester City.
The potentially make-or-break fortnight concludes with what’ll inevitably be dubbed a Carabao Cup final as Newcastle come to Anfield on Wednesday 26 February.
From having five Premier League games in 15 days, Liverpool then play just one in the subsequent 35. A combination of FA Cup weekends, the Wembley date against the Magpies and an international break means that the Reds’ only top-flight fixture in March is at home to Southampton on Saturday 8th.
Liverpool facing stern test of Premier League title credentials
In a peculiar twist, the two Champions League midweeks that LFC were supposed to have off from topping the league phase of that competition have both been taken up by rescheduled Premier League fixtures, thus depriving them of the benefit of their near-perfect European exploits.
That intense fortnight will be the ultimate test of our title credentials, not just in terms of how tightly the games are packed but also that it includes trips to Goodison Park, the Etihad Stadium and Villa Park, along with a tough home match against a buoyant Newcastle.
Slot’s team would do remarkably well not to drop points this month, and Arsenal will be waiting to pounce on any slip-ups as they attempt to reel in the current six-point gap between first and second.
Conversely, if Liverpool were to come through that five-match sequence with full marks (or even a bigger lead than at present), it’d feel as though an enormous psychological barrier has been scaled, and it’d provide a hammer blow to the Gunners’ title aspirations.
The peculiar fixture scheduling is far from ideal for the Reds, but they look better equipped than any other team in the Premier League to face the challenge head-on and come out of it in a position of strength.
