Kenley Ward
Dailysports's expert
Liverpool
Aston Villa
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On May 20, Anfield (Liverpool) will host the match of the 37th round of the English Premier League, in which Liverpool will compete with Aston Villa. The battle will start at 16:00 CET.
Liverpool
The team, generally speaking, totally lost its positions. It is pretty symbolic that everything ended with a defeat made by Real Madrid in the Champions League again; there was only one difference – that time the team lost to the grandee from Madrid not in the final, but already at the 1/8 stage. It had no chances to defend the title in the FA Cup (although it is worth remembering that it was possible to take at least the Super Cup at the beginning of the draw). Furthermore, it goes without saying that there will be a decline in the Premier League, a serious one – it remains only to understand how deep the vice-champion will “sink”. Taking into account the peak of the crisis, it seemed that “the Reds”, like Chelsea, would be left without the European competition at all. Then there began the rise of April and May – a comeback for a draw in the battle against Arsenal was followed by a winning streak that de facto has guaranteed at least the Europa League. Nowadays, there is a chance to climb into the top 4, catching up with either Manchester United or Newcastle. The match with Leicester that took place on Monday resulted in a devastating 3-0 success.
Aston Villa
The club is also getting motivation for the final matches of the current season. And one can only guess how it would have ended if Unai Emery had been working not since November, when he took the responsibility after the dismissal of Steven Gerrard, but since the summer. On the other hand, an unexpectedly fast and strong progress can be seen. After all, the representative of Birmingham is among the contenders for a ticket to the European tournament zone right now. However, the junction of April and May brought the defeats with the same 0-1 score – Manchester United and Wolverhampton were stronger. Speaking about previous Saturday, the team confidently won in the struggle with a direct competitor, Tottenham. The final score was pretty modest – 2-1, but Kane was allowed to succeed from the penalty already in the 90th minute of the game. Thus, it equalled the points with “the Spurs”, but still there is a need to stay in the 6th place, or at least in the 7th one – Brighton remains in the race.
The statistics of head-to-head matches
Liverpool has won all 5 previous head-to-head matches. The one that took place in the current season resulted in an away 3-1 victory.
Predictions
Bookmakers do not doubt about the success of Liverpool. It will play at the home arena and is motivated as much as possible – thus, we bet on the victory of “the Reds” with “a -1 goal handicap” (odd: 1.79).
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