Liverpool suffered another home loss in the Premier League on Sunday and now finds itself way off the pace in the fight for a top-four spot. Could Jürgen Klopp’s men crash out of the Champions League as well?
The Reds head into the second leg of a Round of 16 tie with Leipzig holding a 2-0 lead, but a big improvement is needed to get through to the next round. They are still heavily favored to advance by bookmaker 10Bet who has Liverpool to qualify available at odds 1.11. Leipzig offers great value with the odds at 6.50.
※ Current Odds Date & Time: March 9th, 7:30 P.M. (EST)
Klopp’s men ended a three-game losing streak with a 2-0 win over Leipzig on Feb. 16, but three further losses have followed in four games and the team simply looks broken. There are no signs of high intensity, which has brought them huge success in recent years and they look mentally and physically drained.
Liverpool offered breath-taking attacking football – even early this season – but the team is simply drifting through games right now with no energy and creativity. It’s like Klopp’s 2014-15 Dortmund all over again, which was among the most exciting teams in Europe but caught the injury bug and ended up finishing seventh in the league while crashing out of Europe early.
Having suffered six consecutive losses at Anfield, Liverpool must be over the moon that their home game in the Champions League will be played in Budapest. But will it help them stay in contention?
Leipzig are playing their best football of the season at the moment with the loss to Liverpool their only outing without a win in nine games. They have recorded six clean sheets during the run and have scored at least twice in all but one match.
This is only the third Champions League campaign in Leipzig’s history, but Julian Nagelsmann led his side to the semi-finals last season, which shows that they are no pushovers and the lack of experience really doesn’t mean anything. Their quality is further proved by the fact that Nagelsmann’s men are just two points adrift of Bayern Munich in the Bundesliga this season.
Liverpool can pick you apart easily on their day, but these days have been very rare since December and they face a top-class defensive team here that allows only 2.4 shots on target in the Bundesliga.
Scoring has been a problem for Leipzig without Timo Werner, but they take on a defensively fragile team that’s lacking in confidence, so it seems like there’s still plenty to play for despite Liverpool’s two-goal lead in the tie.
