The hosts must have been buzzing in training this week after that 5-0 demolition of Forest. Those points have taken them up to 7th and to within one of 4th place, which are dizzy heights indeed. They have had a full week to prepare for the league leaders who travelled to Eindhoven in midweek to lose a fairly meaningless Champions League game with PSV ahead of which my notes included.......

 

PSV obviously need a result more than Liverpool and are certainly not used to losing at the Philips-Stadion where they are unbeaten in nine Champions League games and a scarcely believable 35 Eredivisie games, where they are 32-3-0 with a 115-21 goal difference. The visitors are the best team in the EPL at present and probably top 2-3 in Europe and have endless offensive options, but you cannot dispute that this is probably the least important game they will play in what remains of 2024-25. They are coming off a 4-1 win over Ipswich where I set out what might be some problems lying around the corner.

 

I do not know if we are seeing the first signs of a wobble, but Liverpool have already played 10 games more than the Cherries this season and three more this month alone and at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I do expect the visitors lack of rotation, especially in the early months of the campaign to eventually come at a cost. They did leave a lot of senior players back in Liverpool in midweek, which was correct, but a rarity and the game still meant a lack of prep time for this fixture and well, odds are just massive for the "upset".

 

Don't be too disappointed if the goals do not come early, Bournemouth have a great 23-8 goal difference after the 60th minute, which is almost matched by Liverpool's 22-8 and surely we will see late action today.

 

 

 

Good luck!