Arne Slot has decided to take a strong squad to Anfield to play West Ham in the League Cup, with 18 players spotted on the team bus.
While Slot may decide to take several players out of the starting XI, he will still have a strong squad and bench to call upon, should Liverpool need it.
Ahead of the match, a supporter filmed the team getting off the bus and walking into the Titanic Hotel, giving us an idea of the selection we will see against West Ham.
18 Liverpool players spotted
Strong squad tonight anyway ??? pic.twitter.com/d9lsbadGJ5
— Eoghan ??? (@dublinredYNWA) September 25, 2024
Goalkeepers: Kelleher, Jaros
Defenders: Van Dijk, Quansah, Gomez, Alexander-Arnold, Bradley, Tsimikas, Robertson
Midfielders: Mac Allister, Szoboszlai, Jones, Endo, Morton
Forwards: Salah, Gakpo, Jota, Chiesa
The obvious names not on that list are Ibrahima Konate, Ryan Gravenberch, Luis Diaz, Darwin Nunez and Trey Nyoni.
This doesn’t necessarily mean they won’t be involved – they may gone into the hotel while the camera wasn’t recording and not been spotted.
• READ HERE: Liverpool lineup options vs. West Ham with Chiesa 1 of 10 changes
For some of those players, it makes sense that they would be rested for the West Ham game.
Konate has started every match for Liverpool since coming on at half time in the Premier League opener at Ipswich. Meanwhile, Gravenberch has played from the start in every game for club and country this season.
Diaz, too, has had a heavy workload over the last few months.
For Nunez and Nyoni, it is more possible that they just weren’t spotted on camera as adding them to the equation would bring the squad size to 20, the maximum allowed for a League Cup fixture.
What we can say is that Jarell Quansah, Joe Gomez and Conor Bradley are all expected to start, as are Curtis Jones, Cody Gakpo, Diogo Jota and Federico Chiesa.
In addition, we could see Kostas Tsimikas replace Andy Robertson while Wataru Endo should get his first club start of the campaign.
On his selection for the match, Slot said: “I want all of them to play. Unfortunately that’s not possible, because you can only name 11.
“But we will play with the best possible team and that can sometimes also mean that other players that have played a lot are maybe a bit more tired.
“So that means, because the differences are so small, that I will select for this game different players.”
