Venue: Stamford Bridge
Date: Tuesday, 29 November
Kick-off: 1945 GMT
Here we go then, yet another meeting with Liverpool and in spite of our win against Wolves in the League at the weekend, the knives are still a little to close to AVB’s back for comfort. As for Daliglish, well that smug fucker is safe in the knowledge that he hasn’t lost against us in 12 previous games as Liverpool manager.
Of course, we can shrug it off as ‘just the Carling Cup’ although any defeat to the scousers comes hard, not least of all because we only lost to them ten days ago. Any repeat of that will therefore not be easy to stomach.
MANAGERS’ VIEWS
After our weekend’s win, AVB isn’t exactly getting ideas above his station although it’s probably fair to say his focus remains on results aside from tonight’s. The Chelsea manager says “We’re not going to fill ourselves with arrogance and think this is going to be a good period from now on. We have to wait and see but what makes us proud in this difficult situation is that if we reflect on the games we played we didn’t deserve the results we ended up with. December will be very important. We have the Champions League fixture to play but the rest are Premier League fixtures and December can have a part to play in what will happen. For Chelsea to continue to be competitive we will need a good December and then see more or less how it ends up for us. We have important games, Newcastle away, Man City at home, Tottenham away, difficult games but that can change the table. Hopefully we can be up to that level.”
Dalglish meanwhile, seems content to whinge – for a change – saying ”To ask any team or any players to play two games of high intensity in 48 hours is a bit of a joke. We know we’ve got to accept it although we don’t agree with it, and it won’t affect the application or give us an excuse. ‘There’ll be one or two bumps and bruises I would have thought, and maybe one or two missing, but we have a strong squad and we’ve made changes in other Carling Cup matches.”
SQUAD NEWS
For Chelsea, Essien (knee) remains out and Meireles is cup-tied and we should expect plenty of changes from the side that beat Wolves. Lukaku, McEachran and Kalou could be in, Torres might even get a start although JT’s unfortunate yellow against Wolves means he misses out through suspension.
For Liverpool, Dalglish is expected to make changes as well. Bellamy is likely to return, Carragher should make his first appearance in over a month and there could be recalls for Kelly, Maxi Rodriguez, Spearing and Carroll.
TEAMS
CHELSEA (from): Cech, Bosingwa, Ivanovic, Bertrand, Alex, Cole, Luiz, Mikel, Romeu, Ramires, Lampard, Mata, Malouda, McEachran, Torres, Drogba, Kalou, Sturridge, Lukaku, Turnbull.
LIVERPOOL (from): Reina, Kelly, Carragher, Coates, Enrique, Spearing, Lucas, Rodriguez, Henderson, Carroll, Bellamy, Doni, Johnson, Agger, Skrtel, Wilson, Aurelio, Adam, Downing, Kuyt, Suarez.
LAST MEETING
Chelsea 1-2 Liverpool (20th November 2011)
PREDICTION
It’s our fifth meeting in League Cup history and we’ve had 2 wins each so far – with ours the more recent. But in spite of us winning 12 of our 29 games since 2004 (to Lierpool’s 10), Dalglish has never lost to us in 12 games as Liverpool manager. Irrespective of a comfortable win against Wolves at the weekend, to be honest this is probably the last tie we need right now. Optimistic of a win? In a word – no.