Luis Diaz is having a big influence on the Reds' form recently. — Reuters
IT is going to be an anxious end to the month of February for Liverpool, with two huge back-to-back Premier League matches happening within four days.
The Reds will be taking on Manchester City at the Etihad Stadium this weekend, before hosting Newcastle United at Anfield in midweek.
While City have not been having a good season, Liverpool, too, are seemingly starting to look shaky in recent weeks.
The 2-2 draw with Aston Villa in midweek, which could be seen positively after having fought back from being 2-1 down, has invoked plenty of questions for Arne Slot and his team.
Are Liverpool having a dreadful dip in form now, as feared? If so, then it would have really come at a bad time.
Is Slot overusing Ryan Gravenberch, who has been excellent in the first half of the season?
The Dutch midfielder has started in every single league match this season and there is fear that the physical and mental toll is starting to show.
His performance against the Villans was pretty damning as he looked to be out of energy the entire match.
Should the club have brought in new players, especially the Number Six position that they have been searching for, as another option in place of Gravenberch?
Being the club’s best defensive midfield option, he will definitely be retained in the starting line-up again against City, while Wataru Endo continues to warm the bench.
When Gravenberch is not up to his best, this would have an impact on the defence.
There have also been plenty of criticisms on some of the defenders, especially Andrew Robertson over his performance this season.
The Scottish captain has not really been himself, struggling at times to defend while also failing to register any goal or assist contributions this season thus far.
Two other players that are also getting flak include Luis Diaz and Darwin Nunez, the latter for obvious reasons.
Diaz, who showed so much promise in the first few matches earlier this season, now looks off pace.
He lost his spot on the left wing to Cody Gakpo before the latter’s injury and was turned into a makeshift centre forward in some games, but struggled to have any impact.
Nunez, well, is just being Nunez. Lack of game time has mainly frustrated the Uruguayan and he seems lost amid the chaos in recent matches that he was involved in.
His best performance was still the 2-0 win over Brentford in mid-January, in which he scored the two goals in stoppage time.
Since the 4-0 hammering of Tottenham Hotspur in the Carabao Cup semi-finals, Liverpool have failed to keep clean sheets in their subsequent matches.
It is something Slot will truly have to work and improve on before they take on Man City.
Despite City’s own problems, their attack is still something to be wary of, with the dangers posed by Erling Haaland, Phil Foden, Savinho and Omar Marmoush, their January transfer market acquisition from Eintracht Frankfurt.
Eyes will also be cast on Marmoush, dubbed by the media as the “New Pharaoh”, and whether he can upstage Mohamed Salah, the “Egyptian King” at the Etihad.
Marmoush, who scored 20 goals and made 14 assists in all competitions for the German side this season before making his move to England, has continued with his good form and has certainly impressed.
The 26-year-old forward would have scored on his debut against Chelsea late last month but was unfortunately flagged for offside.
But his hat trick against Newcastle United last week may just be the start of something special, as he continues to gel with his teammates.
As for Salah, who is being called the best player in the world right now, he continues to break records for the Reds.
The 32-year-old, whose contract expires at the end of the season and has yet to reach a new agreement with Liverpool, tops the league’s goal-scoring and assist charts with 24 goals and 15 assists.
His goal against Aston Villa was his 15th away goal, the most by any player for the club in a single Premier League season, besting Luis Suarez’s tally of 14 goals set during the 2013/14 campaign.
A week earlier, he set a new league record for away goal involvements in a single season with 14 goals and nine assists, two goals more than previously set by Andy Cole in the 1993/94 season with Newcastle.
Salah is now sixth in the Premier League all-time top scorers chart with 181 goals, just three less than City’s Sergio Aguero in fifth.
The clash between Liverpool and City will certainly have huge ramifications to the title race.
A win for the Reds will surely allow them to pull further away from Arsenal, although the North London side is expected to make short work of West Ham United this week to close the gap.
A defeat, meanwhile, will give the Gunners more confidence that they can catch up.
