FA Cup Replay’s Effect for Liverpool

The oldest football competition in the world, FA Cup, has been begun for EPL team on the last weekend. Most PL team got a draw against lower division team, unless Man City v West Ham and Everton v Leicester City. Overall, the stronger teams won the 5^th round FA Cup preliminary round although there were some surprising results.

Jurgen Klopp has to think hard of his squad due to extra fixture on January. http://www.liverpoolfc.com/news/first-team/249857-jurgen-klopp-on-fifa-fan-award-fans-of-lfc-and-bvb-should-be-proud

Man City started the FA Cup campaign with a big 5-0 win against West Ham away. Different with most PL team who rotated their squad, Guardiola only made a few changes in his squad and kept his strong starting line up on the game. At the end of the game, The Citizen had a tremendous victory, gave a revival signal to title contenders that they are back. A day later, the defending champion, Man United, also had a party at home against lower division team. Subsequently, three of top 6 PL London team also won the FA Cup match in different way. Chelsea had a convincing victory 4-1 at home against Peterborough despite the skipper, John Terry received red card at 65 minutes. Spurs found their win at second half by 2 goals scored after being held 0-0 by Aston Villa at first half. Meanwhile Arsenal must work hard to get their win after left behind 1-0 at first half before turned the situation into 2-1 at second half. The biggest surprising result was Liverpool, who got 0-0 draw against Plymouth at home.

Liverpool played with the youngest squad ever in their FA Cup history. Jurgen Klopp had to rotate his squad due to busy fixture before and after the match. Before FA Cup 5^th round match, most PL team played in hectic fixtures on December and new year period. After that, they will play League Cup (EFL) semifinal on the midweek and super big match away against rival, Man United three days later. In addition, they have to lose their key players. Sadio Mane leaves the squad to play in African Cup for at least three weeks, could be worse if his country goes to knockout phase. Meanwhile Phillipe Coutinho is still in recovery on his injury. He is estimated back to the pitch next week or could be on the bench in Man United game. For that reason, the German manager did a lot of changes in his squad at FA Cup match.

Consequently, The Reds still has to play vs Plymouth again on FA Cup replay match after United game, but this time at the Championship team’s home. If they want to win, of course Jurgen Klopp has not to play the same young squad again, at least he must add some key players to play with young players. Unfortunately, after replay match, another busy fixture is waiting Liverpool. The Merseyside Red will play at PL then EFL Cup 2^nd leg semifinal. Klopp has to be smart on his squad choices to play this month. If not, he might get the worst result plus injured player(s). The best option is keep rotating the squad and mixing the experience players with young and energetic players on his starting line-up.

Another option for Jurgen Klopp is arriving new player(s) in January transfer window. According to the news and gossip, Liverpool try to sign new attackers, Jese Rodriguez, Julian Brandt, and Quincy Promes plus a new goalkeeper, Joe hart. The attackers are young and talented players that can make Liverpool’s attack become more dangerous, besides Joe Hart is an experience goalkeeper that can solve Klopp’s GK problem. If The Reds can sign one of attackers and the England goalkeeper, it will be a great addition for them to compete either in PL title contenders track or League Cup and FA Cup campaign because they will have a strong team with a good depth squad.