Sports Mole takes an in-depth look at how Liverpool could line up for Friday’s pre-season friendly against Real Betis.
On the back of a losing start to life in the Liverpool chair, Arne Slot will hope that the second time is the charm when the Reds face Real Betis in Pittsburgh in the early hours of Friday morning UK time.
Last Friday, Liverpool were beaten 1-0 by Preston North End in their first friendly of the summer, where Slot had to make do without several Euro 2024 and Copa America representatives.
All of Darwin Nunez, Luis Diaz, Alisson Becker, Alexis Mac Allister, Joe Gomez, Alexander-Arnold, Van Dijk, Cody Gakpo, Diogo Jota, Ibrahima Konate and Ryan Gravenberch will not be available for Friday’s game, and the same goes for injured youngsters Jayden Danns and Bobby Clark.
However, a handful of first-team regulars boarded the plane to the USA, including Dominik Szoboszlai and Mohamed Salah, who could feature at the tip of a three-man attacking trident.
Ben Doak and Fabio Carvalho – back from injury and a Hull City loan respectively – may flank the Egypt international, while Szoboszlai is primed to start in the engine room, potentially alongside Curtis Jones and Wataru Endo.
Harvey Elliott would therefore be restricted to minutes off the bench, and Szoboszlai is one of two Euro 2024 representatives in line to start on Friday, the other being left-back Andy Robertson.
Conor Bradley is primed to deputise for Trent Alexander-Arnold on the opposite side, and the backline could be completed by three players expected to join other clubs in the coming weeks; Caoimhin Kelleher, Sepp van den Berg and Nat Phillips.
Liverpool possible starting lineup:
Kelleher; Bradley, Phillips, Van den Berg, Robertson; Jones, Endo, Szoboszlai; Doak, Salah, Carvalho
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