On Wednesday night in South Philadelphia (or Thursday morning, if you’re watching from across the pond), 2 of Europe’s biggest clubs in Liverpool and Arsenal will face off in a pre-season friendly at Lincoln Financial Field as they prepare for the 2024-25 Premier League Season.
Pre-Season So Far:
Wednesday night’s meeting with Liverpool will be Arsenal’s third tune-up match of pre-season, with The Gunners edging out Bournemouth on Penalty Kicks after regulation ended in a 1-1 draw. In their 2nd meeting of their US pre-season tour, Arsenal defeated Manchester United by a score of 2-1. That match would also go to Penalty Kicks after the final whistle as part of pre-season training, with Manchester United taking home a consolation victor try with the spot-kicks.
Liverpool kicked off their 2024 pre-season and life under Arne Slot with a closed door meeting against Preston North End to which they lost 1-0. Since then, Liverpool have arrived for their pre-season tour in America and defeated Real Betis by a score of 1-0 at Acrisure Stadium in Pittsburgh, PA.
Available Players:
Arsenal
Arsenal, looking to finally get over the hump and dethrone Manchester City as the Premier League’s Champion for 4 consecutive years, brings a relatively strong team stateside for pre-season. A few big names have yet to join back up with the squad, but new signing Riccardo Calafiori met up with his new teammates yesterday morning before practice.
Goalkeepers: Hein, Nygaard, Rojas, Setford
Defenders: Calafiori, Gabriel, Heaven, Kiwior, Nichols, Reikik, Timber, White, Zinchenki
Midfielders: Gower, Havertz, Jorginho, Lewis-Skelly, Martinelli, Nwaneri, Odegaard, Oulad M’Hand, Partey, Rosiak, Smith Rowe, Vieira
Forwards: Jesus, Nketiah, Nelson, Sage Jr, Trossard
Unavailable Players: David Raya, Aaron Ramsdale, Bukayo Saka, Declan Rice, Takehiro Tomiyasu, Kieran Tierney
Liverpool
Liverpool too are missing players of importance during their pre-season tour, but are hard at work bedding into a new system under new manager Arne Slot, which looks to unraveling differently than life known under Jurgen Klopp’s “Heavy Metal Football”.
Goalkeepers: Davies, Jars, Kelleher, Pitaluga
Defenders: Beck, Bradley, Chambers, Nallo, Phillips, Quansah, Tsimikas, Van den Berg
Midfielders: Bajcetic, Doak, Endo, Elliott, Nyoni, Morton, Stephenson, Szoboszlai
Forwards: Blair, Carvalho, Gordon, Jota, Koumas, Salah
Unavailable Players: Alisson, Virgil van Dijk, Andy Robertson, Alexis Mac Allister, Luis Diaz, Darwin Nunez, Cody Gakpo, Jayden Danns, Bobby Clark, Fabian Mrozek
Questionable: Curtis Jones
Predicted Lineups:
Arsenal
Mikael Arteta has used pre-season to give Arsenal youngsters like Ayden Heaven and Ethan Nwaneri considerable amounts of time to showcase their skillset when playing next to first-team players. Without both Aaron Ramsdale and David Raya, Karl Hein has made the start in both pre-season matches and played brightly, saving 2 of the Penalty Kicks against Bournemouth.
Jurrien Timber and Ben White have held down Arsenal’s backline, with Myles Lewis-Skelly and Oleksandr Zinchenko splitting duty at Right Back. Arteta’s new defender, Riccardo Calafiori, is likely to make his first appearance with the club, but I’d expect him to start on the bench as he just arrived with the team on Monday morning. Center back Gabriel looks set to make his first start of pre-season, as does Gabriel Martinelli.
Formation (4-3-3): Hein (GK), White (RB), Timber (CB), Gabriel (CB), Kiwior (LB), Nwaneri (CM), Odegaard (CM), Partey (DM), Vieira (RW), Martinelli (LW), Havertz (ST).
Liverpool
Without a true striker in the side against Real Betis, Arne Slot chose to adapt to the players he had at his disposable, rather than make his players try and fit into a system that doesn’t exactly work for them. With that, we saw Harvey Elliott and Dominik Szoboszlai play in advanced roles high up the pitch. Caoimhin Kelleher got the start in net against Betis in the absence of Alisson, with Sepp van den Berg and Jarell Quansah as the CB pairing in front of him.
Wataru Endo and Curtis Jones played deep in Liverpool’s midfield, but with transfer rumors swirling around Endo and Jones picking up a slight knock against Real Betis, we could see some new names enter the lineup Wednesday night. Diogo Jota’s return to training camp provides Arne Slot and Liverpool a huge boost, and a more natural option up front.
Formation (4-2-3-1): Kelleher (GK), Bradley (RB), Quansah (CB), Van den Berg (CB), Tsimikas (LB), Endo (CM), Morton (CM), Szoboszlai (CAM) Salah (RW), Carvalho (LW), Jota (ST).
Sights and Sounds from Training:
Mikael Arteta’s Ambitions heading into 2024-25
The arrival of Riccardo Calafiori into Arsenal’s team clearly has Mikel Arteta feeling confident going into the 2024-25 season, because when asked what Arsenal needs to do in order to finally de-thrown Pep and Manchester City as the Premier Leagues top-dog, Arteta offered an ambitious response:
“114 points – if we do that we will win the league for sure! This is the objective”
I think you can tell from the tone in Arteta’s voice that he’s slightly joking – but he’s also probably not wrong. It’s been proven time and time again that you’ve got to be nearly perfect in order to beat out Manchester City throughout the duration a 38 match season.
Arne Slot’s Training
I had an opportunity to sit in on Liverpool’s training session on Monday morning and I was quite impressed with not only Arne Slot’s training methods, but his willingness to get involved and work with players one-on-one. It’s clear Arne Slot’s Liverpool team are going to need to be comfortable playing in tight spaces, both with the ball at their feet and passing through them. This clip from Slot’s training the other day exemplifies the tight windows that the new Liverpool manager wants his team exploiting through the midfield, something Wataru Endo said will take some time to get comfortable with when asked after training on Monday.
And though Slot’s preferred formation ends to be that 4-2-3-1, he’s been seen setting his Liverpool team up in the formation below during training sessions here in Philadelphia, which could be a potential starting XI come Wednesday night
Prediction:
Arsenal, while still missing some key players, received a huge boost by getting Kai Havertz, Gabriel Martinelli, and Gabriel Magalhães back onto the pitch against Manchester United. I’d expect all 3 to start Wednesday night, which should give Arsenal an edge over Arne Slot’s Liverpool, who are without a plethora of strong names in their squad during pre-season in America. I’m going with a 3-2 Arsenal win at Lincoln Financial Field on Wednesday night.
Where to Watch:
Date: Wednesday, July 31st @ 7:30pm
Location: Lincoln Financial Field – Philadelphia, PA
Watch: ESPN | Live Stream: Fubo, ESPN+, LFCTV GO, Arsenal Match Pass
AP Photo/Jon Super
